Who Has an Interest in "Public Interest Technology"? Critical Questions for Working with Local Governments & Impacted Communities

Logan Stapleton*, Devansh Saxena, Anna Kawakami, Tonya Nguyen, Asbjørn Ammitzbøll Flügge, Motahhare Eslami, Naja Holten Møller, Min Kyung Lee, Shion Guha, Kenneth Holstein, Haiyi Zhu

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingArticle in proceedingsResearchpeer-review

4 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

Local governments use a wide array of software, algorithms, and data systems across domains such as policing, probation, child protective services, courts, education, public employment services, homelessness services, etc. A growing body of work in CSCW and HCI has emerged to study, design, or demonstrate the boundaries of these technologies, oftentimes working with local governments. Local governments ostensibly aim to serve the public. So, some prior work has collaborated with local governments in the name of the public interest. However, others argue that local governments primarily police poor, minoritized communities, especially with increasingly limited funding for public services such as education or housing. These tensions raise critical questions: (How) should researchers collaborate with local governments? When should we oppose governments? How do we ethically engage with communities without being extractive? In this one-day workshop, we will bring together researchers from academia, the public sector, and community organizations to first take stock of work around public interest technologies. We will reflect on critical questions to orient the future of public interest technology and how we can work with, around, or against local governments while centering impacted communities.

Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationCSCW 2022 - Conference Companion Publication of the 2022 Computer Supported Cooperative Workand Social Computing
Number of pages5
PublisherAssociation for Computing Machinery
Publication date2022
Pages282-286
ISBN (Electronic)9781450391900
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2022
Event25th ACM Conference on Computer-Supported Cooperative Work and Social Computing, CSCW 2022 - Virtual, Online, Taiwan, Province of China
Duration: 8 Nov 202222 Nov 2022

Conference

Conference25th ACM Conference on Computer-Supported Cooperative Work and Social Computing, CSCW 2022
Country/TerritoryTaiwan, Province of China
CityVirtual, Online
Period08/11/202222/11/2022
SponsorACM SIGCHI

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
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Keywords

  • child welfare
  • government algorithms
  • impacted communities
  • public interest technology

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