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Available open access digitally under CC-BY-NC-ND licence.
Technologies are not created hostile, but they can become so. Through neglect, austerity or repurposing, the systems that shape our lives can cause profound harm to people, animals, and physical and social environments in ways their creators neither anticipated nor acknowledged.
Drawing on examples spanning border control, welfare systems, urban design and AI, this provocative collection introduces the concept of technological innocence: the obliviousness that allows bias and hostility to flourish unchallenged.
Moving beyond naïve design ethics, it offers scholars, designers and policy makers a powerful new vocabulary for confronting the darker consequences of technological choice.
''Hostility by Design' puts to bed once and for all any notion that our technologies are somehow merely neutral things. The astounding range of examples – high-tech and low, large-scale infrastructure and microprocessors – make the inherent politics of technology undeniable'. - Robert Rosenberger, Carter School of Public Policy, Georgia Institute of Technology
'This beautifully curated collection reveals the myriad ways in which technologies become or are made hostile. It will captivate students and general readers alike'. - Claudia Aradau, Department of War Studies, King’s College London
'A vital account that shows how technologies lend themselves to weaponisation, by planned hostility of innocence by which power designs itself.' - Nishant Shah, School of Journalism and Communication, The Chinese University of Hong Kong
'Wyatt has brought together a diverse and exciting collection of authors and examples to illustrate how, when and where technologies can become hostile to people, the environment and democracy.' - Judy Wajcman, Department of Sociology, London School of Economics
'Bringing together leading scholars from across disciplines, this provocative collection challenges assumptions and develops a shared vocabulary for understanding the hostilities embedded in all technologies.' - Jennifer Pybus, Department of Politics, York University, Canada
1 Introduction: Hostility, Bias, and Technological Innocence - Sally Wyatt
2 Agriculture: Let the Hostilities Begin! A Tale of Two Digital Strategies to De- vs. Re-Territorialize Agriculture - Léa Stiefel and Alain Sandoz
3 Architecture: They Deserved It! The Geographies of Affect and the Hostility/Justice Conundrum of Spite Architecture - Annaclaudia Martini
4 Blockchain: Blockchain Technology and Repeatable Innocence - Tim Jordan
5 Borders: Navigating the Eastern Aegean Border Archipelago: Grey Zones and Black Holes by Design - Vasiliki Makrygianni
6 Bureaucracy: Biometrics, Bureaucracy, and Hostility: The Case of Aadhar in India - Vidya Subramanian
7 Cameras: Chinese Big Tech Surveillance Cameras Turning Hostile in Afghanistan - Ausma Bernot
8 Cars: Gilbert Simondon and Temporal Hostility - Massimiliano Simons and Darryl Cressman
9 Curation: Epistemic Curation: Lessons from an Exhibition on The Exclusionary City - Ole B Jensen, Carsten Hvid Nielsen and Pia Justesen
10 Fences: Fencing the Hong Kongers: Protection, Control, Expulsion - Jeroen de Kloet and Yiu Fai Chow
11 Games: Gacha Alchemy: Hostility by Design in Contemporary Digital Games - Ningxiang Sun
12 Gender: Excluded by Default: Binary Gender Infrastructures as Algorithmic Design Hostility - Christoffer Koch Andersen
13 Health: Creating Hostile Technologies - Alison Powell and Philipp Seuferling
14 Hearing: The Labour of Hearing: Musicality, Mediation and Digital Hearing Aids - Nishtha Bharti and Matthew Spring
15 Nuclear: Ecological Hostility: AI, Data Centres, and a ‘Nuclear Renaissance’ - Annika Richterich
16 Sewers: The Despotism of Drainage: Mexico City’s Sewer Tunnels and the Limits of Technical Democracy - Dean Chahim
17 Shoes: High-Heel Hostility - Chris Hesselbein
18 Spinning: Unwinding Hostilities of Cotton Spinning Technologies - Vivek S Oak
19 Ultrasound: Acoustic Pest Repellents and Ultrasonic Hostility in a Multispecies World - Joeri Bruyninckx
20 Urban: Critical Theory and Hostile Urban Design - Blake D Scott and Lisann Penttilä
21 Weapons: Governing Hostility by Ethics: Towards a Responsible Use of AI-enabled Weapons - Jens Hälterlein
22 Welfare: From Solidarity to Suspicion: Hostility in the Dutch Welfare State - Marijke Roosen and Cassy Juhasz
23 X-rays: Hostile Examiners: Considering X-ray Machines as Hostile Technologies in the Canadian Immigrant Medical Exam - Brigid Goulem
24 Zombies: Drift, Pause, Insurrection: The Maastricht Zombie Walk - Christian Ernsten and Claartje Rasterhoff