TAD-30306 Social Justice, Technology and Development

Course

Credits 6.00

Language of instruction:

English

Contents:

'Social justice' and 'technology' are usually viewed as very different issues. However, time and again technological change co-produces societal controversies. Examples discussed in this course include biofuel, transgenic crops, land redistribution, standards expressing corporate social responsibility, pesticides and food safety standards, and payments for environmental services. This course deals with theories and concrete situations in which social justice issues are intertwined with technological change. The course offers frameworks to analyse inequality, poverty, power in social transformations, and representations of injustice. The framework for this social analysis of technological change is interdisciplinary as it uses selected notions from political philosophy, science and technology studies, development studies, sociology and anthropology. It particularly focuses on three bodies of theory: social justice theories, Cultural Theory, and Political Ecology. The first part of the course introduces key concepts of social justice theories and contains exercises to work with these concepts. We will discuss how development studies can be reframed in social justice terms. The technologies that are used as cases include both social engineering technologies (such as land reform or standards) as well as new, complex artefacts, such as transgenic crops.
The second part of the course explains the relevance of Political Ecology and grid-group Cultural Theory for analysing the social justice-technology nexus. We will exercise with key concepts of these theories in order to analyse the maldistribution of resources and contrasting perceptions of new technologies; this includes a critical analysis of a documentary and other audiovisual materials.
The third part of the course analyses different large, state-based (revolutionary and reformist) and market-based forms of social transformation that have been initiated as technological change to foster social justice. Three historical transformations will be used as case studies: Soviet collectivization, land reform in Latin America and the Philippines, and new standards for corporate social responsibility.

Learning outcomes:

By the end of the course students are expected to:
- be able to explain key concepts of selected social justice theories;
- be able to set out key concepts of political ecology and cultural theory and to apply these in the analysis of social-technical change and social injustice in developing countries;
- be able to characterize some crucial connections between social justice theory, development theory, technology studies, political ecology, and cultural theory;
- have developed their ability to formulate analytical questions about inequality, marginalization and power differences in processes of social-technical change;
- have gained more experience in verbally expressing their knowledge of, and critical reflection on, the theories and concrete cases presented in the course.

Activities:

i) Attending lectures, ii) Discussion sessions and tutorials with assignments: short exercises (group and individually), written and oral presentation of a critical article review (individually), writing assignment (individually), iii) final exam

Examination:

Weighted mark of i) participation in discussions and presentations (10%), writing assignment (15%), review (30%), final exam (45%). In order to pass the course each element must be at least 5.0; the overall average should be 5.5 or higher.

Literature:

Course outline and information about literature is available through EDUweb.