Over the course of three days, a group of 29 international participants with an impressive diversity in disciplinary and cultural backgrounds engaged in a variety of lectures and workshops. Together with a wide range of experts and practitioners, the participants explored the complex relationship between digital technologies and social inequality and discussed how we can work towards a more inclusive and equitable future.
The conference began with a talk by Prof Linnet Taylor who discussed the concept of data justice and how it relates to current data and AI governance strategies. Prof Taylor proposed four benchmarks for good data governance that centered on the preservation and strengthening of public infrastructure and public goods, inclusiveness, contestability, accountability, and global responsibility. Lukas Schlögl (PhD) then took the stage to examine the causes of a growing wave of digital activism in the Global South. He argued that this trend is driven by social change, rather than technological advancement alone, and connected empirical evidence about large-scale social media protests to classic theories of value change and political engagement. Seliem El-Sayed (MA) and Prof Barbara Prainsack presented their “Public Value Assessment Tool” that was designed to enable a structured assessment of the extent to which a given data use creates public value. A practical case was used to assess and discuss the public value of data use and highlight the remaining ambiguity and difficulty of operationalizing concepts such as public value.
On the second day, Monika Halkort (PhD) delved into the politics of visibility and racialization in machine sensing in the context of irregular migration in the Mediterranean Sea. She unpacked the multiple layers of transcription, encoding, interpretation and inferences at work in machine sensing and vision and drew attention to the racializing effects of digital infrastructures and datafication. Prof Felix Stalder, Prof Vladan Joler and Dr Katja Mayer followed a cartographic approach, they explored connections using the example of “Anatomy of an AI System” and the “Infrastructure of a Migratory Bird” project. A public lecture by Noopur Raval (PhD) on how to critically rethink expertise and invisibility to support decolonial digital practice completed the intense programme.
The final day of the conference was again a day full of insightful discussions and interactive workshops. The day began with a keynote by Prof Joe Cannataci, UN Special Rapporteur and Professor at the University of Malta, who spoke about lessons learned from his six-year mandate as the first-ever UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Privacy. He focused on the country reports submitted during his tenure and how these experiences could and should be reflected in legal education on fundamental rights and their varying interpretations globally. Next up was a panel on digital rights in Africa featuring Tima Otu Anwana (LL.M), Mercy King'ori (LL.B) and Dr Samuel Iheanyi Nwankwo. The panel provided an overview of digital rights in Africa and discussed the enforcement of digital rights and the challenges faced in the African context, drawing examples from South Africa, Nigeria, and Kenya. The concluding session was a workshop by Dr Christof Tschohl and Mag Felix Mikolasch, which offered a comprehensive look at digital rights and their enforcement from an NGO perspective. The speakers discussed the key elements of successful enforcement, including finding the right case, legal work, and media work.
Thank you to all speakers, participants and DigiGov members for making the Digigov Winter School 2023 such a valuable learning experience for all of us!
Elisabeth Steindl, Director of the Winter School 2023
