Search

Zum einen ist die Polizei ein entwickeltes Instrumentarium moderner Gesellschaften innerhalb ihrer staatlichen Konstitution und stellt somit die vordergründige "Spitze" der gesellschaftlich institutionalisierten Kontrollfunktionen dar. An ihr lassen sich die Intentionen, Interessen und Widersprüche sozialer Konfliktlagen in ihrer Komplexität nachhaltig aufzeigen. Zum anderen ist die Polizei als Agent der staatlichen Ordnungsaufgabe eine komplexe Organisation, die sich an den Erfordernissen moderner Bürokratien ausrichtet und dazu "rationale Mittel" anzuwenden hat. Ein solches "Mittel" stellt die Technik in ihren verschiedensten Ausprägungen bereit und rückt damit in den polizeilichen Focus. Darüber hinaus ist es gerade der Einsatz avancierter Technologie bei der Polizei gewesen, der in der öffentlichen Diskussion den meisten Wirbel verursacht hat.

Digital visual technologies have become an important tool of humanitarian governance. They allow the monitoring of crises from afar, making it possible to detect human rights violations and refugee movements, despite a crisis area being inaccessible. However, the political effects of such "digital humanitarianism" are understudied. This article aims to amend this gap by analyzing which forms of seeing, showing, and governing refugee camps are enabled by digital technologies. To this end, the article combines scholarship on the politics of the refugee camp with the emerging body of work on digital humanitarianism. It proposes the notion of a "visual assemblage of the refugee camp" to conceptualize the increasing adoption of visual technologies in refugee camp governance. Using the two paradigmatic cases of Zaatari and Azraq, two refugee camps for displaced Syrians in Jordan, the text outlines how this visual assemblage enacts the refugee camp in different ways - thus bringing about different versions of the camp. The case study reveals three such enactments of the refugee camp - as a technology of care and control; as a political space; and, as a governmental laboratory - and discusses how these interact and clash in everyday camp life.

This paper contrasts two approaches to implementing the notoriously ambiguous ideal of sustainability: one driven by the centralized, managerial metaphor of Spaceship Earth, and the other by a notion of stewardship that foregrounds the values of care and obligation. Both approaches depend on infrastructures to enable them, but these are built on different combinations of the material, the social, and the moral. Viewing Earth as a spaceship amenable to human guidance and control makes sense only if we also accept the power of dominant "centers of calculation" that gather and disseminate standardized knowledge instrumentally to ensure global coordination. Stewardship, by contrast, relies on infrastructures of locally shared values and distributed innovation in human-nature relations rather than on universal scientific knowledge or technology. Stewardship is often propagated by social movements seeking to promote globally sustainable ecological practices. The two approaches have markedly different implications for designing future infrastructures to promote transformations to sustainability.

In this article, I discuss the three dominant models of conceiving infrastructural futures in the context of the contemporary ecological emergency and what kinds of futures each model enables and forestalls. Gray infrastructure conceives human-engineered material designs that are able to produce predictable, controllable effects, often at a mass scale. Gray infrastructure also conceives futures that by and large reproduce present Anthropocene relations (e.g., a strict nature/culture divide mediated by technology and human supremacy. Green infrastructure is a more diverse paradigm but generally speaking pursues naturecultural collaborations that seek to bend the Anthropocene trajectory. Still, much of what passes for green infrastructure today fails to challenge industrial-capitalist logics and in this way creates futures that are more reproductive of the Anthropocene trajectory than they intend. Finally, I discuss my concept of "revolutionary infrastructure" as an alternative to gray and green infrastructural imagination. Revolutionary infrastructure resists standardization and categorization but generally appears as local experimental enabling relations, as redirection of potential energy, and as transformational pathways toward non-ecocidal, non-genocidal futures.

Digitalisation oscillates between profound promises of transformation and a nebulous buzzword. The analysis of digital transformation processes leaves hardly any (analysis of) so- cial phenomenon untouched. We argue for understanding digitalisation as a complex and heterogeneous process that cannot be rashly reduced to individual principles or uniform transformation effects. Starting from a working definition of digitalisation, we outline the challenges for social sciences research aiming to conceptualize this heterogeneity. We argue for a more differentiated and socio-historically informed analysis not only of processes of disruptive change through digitalisation, but also of continuities, modifications, and reinforcements. In view of the large number of individual case studies and to avoid one-sided generalisations, comparative analyses of different or supposedly similar digitalisation processes are central. Finally, micro-macro analysis opens up important insights into the multifaceted nature of digital transformation(s), especially in terms of breaks, frictions, and enablements of digitalisation through organising and organisations. Understanding digitalisation as a heterogeneous process does not imply multiplying observations of differences but paying attention to the complexity and embeddedness of digitalisation.

The text follows a dispositive analytical perspective to reconstruct the consequences of the digital transformation for psychotherapeutic care in Germany. The central thesis is that this leads to a non-simultaneous simultaneity of continuity and change in the context of psychotherapeutic care, which fundamentally shifts the dispositive of psychotherapy. While the use of technical media can be traced back to the 1950s, the predominant interplay of cognitive behavioural therapy, digital media, and surveillance capitalism leads to the spread of automated therapy practices that affect the role of the psychotherapist as well as the social significance of professionalised psychotherapy. This leads to a discontinuous continuity of the dispositive of the psychotherapeutic. The argument is illustrated by the entanglement of the digital transformation with the questions of a scientific foundation, deprofessionalisation, democratisation, and datafication of psychotherapeutic care. In this regard, the paper opens up perspectives of a historical-sociological consideration of dispositives with regard to processes of socio-technical change.

Our paper addresses the interplay between digitalization and spatiality, asking how digital transformation processes are affected by peripheral spatial location. The short-term processes of digitalization and its implications for spatiality are widely addressed, especially with regard to urban development and planning, but rural-peripheral areas and periods of medium duration are only rarely the subject of research. Therefore, from a spatial planning perspective our central question is: What role is attributed to materiality in digital social transformation processes in rural-peripheral areas? Employing a multi-sited methodological approach - a sample in two rural regions and two villages in Eastern and Western Germany - the focus is placed on individual digital biographies related to physical, information, and communication technology artefacts. Against the backdrop of Karen Barad's concept of materiality as a constant intraactivity, we discuss digital transformation at the margins with respect to the aspects of newness, specificity, and qualities. This allows us to show different sequences of digitalization that are characterized by specific roles for materiality and spatial location, the changing importance of peripherality, and increasing debordered materiality.

Mit der Blockchain - und allgemein mit Distributed-Ledger-Technologien (DLT) - werden große Erwartungen verknüpft, die Prozesse der digitalen Welt des 21. Jahrhunderts neu zu organisieren, effizienter zu gestalten und bislang ungekannte Möglichkeiten für Transaktionen zwischen Beteiligten in Wirtschaft, Gesellschaft und Verwaltung zu ermöglichen. Diese Chancen müssen genutzt werden. Gleichzeitig ist mit der Blockchain-Technologie wie mit allen anderen digitalen Lösungen die Herausforderung verbunden, die Technologien, Anwendungen und zugrundeliegenden Infrastrukturen nachhaltig zu gestalten und an Energieeffizienz, Klimaschutz und Ressourcenschonung auszurichten. Handlungsbedarf besteht auch bei Blockchain-Anwendungen. Der Energieverbrauch des derzeit größten Blockchain-Netzwerks Bitcoin wird auf bis über 130 TWh/Jahr abgeschätzt, womit eine Größenordnung in Höhe des gesamten Jahresstrombedarfs von Ländern wie Argentinien erreicht würde. Blockchain-Anwendungen sind somit schon heute umweltpolitisch relevante Einflussgrößen und die zu erwartende Wachstumsdynamik erhöht den Handlungsdruck. Es ist das Ziel dieser Kurzstudie, geeignete Nachhaltigkeitskriterien zur Bewertung der Energieverbräuche und Umweltwirkungen von Blockchain-Anwendungen zu identifizieren sowie ein erstes Konzept für deren Implementierung bei der Umsetzung und Vergabe staatlich geförderter oder initiierter Projekte vorzuschlagen.

Seitdem das Fernsehen Politik macht, werden Einwände und Kritik gegen Regierende über den Bildschirm kommuniziert - die Bürger*innen sind in passives Zuschauen gedrängt. Der Aufstieg der sozialen Medien dagegen verspricht neue Möglichkeiten der Teilhabe. Doch wird der öffentliche Raum immer undurchsichtiger, komplexer und schwerer zu fassen: Meinungen und Verhaltensmuster werden zunehmend durch Algorithmen kontrolliert, die globalen Unternehmen unterstehen. Welche Alternativen bleiben angesichts dieser Enteignung? Dissidenz und Hacking? Im Spiegel der forcierten (Zwangs-)Digitalisierung durch die Covid-19-Pandemie widmet sich der Autor aus kultur- und politikwissenschaftlicher Perspektive diesem Komplex.

Research on transition to higher education and young people with disabilities has increased in recent years. However, there is still limited understanding of transition issues and how digital technologies, such as social media and mobile devices, are used by this group of students to manage these issues. This article presents the findings of an empirical study that addressed this matter based on young people's views and experiences. The qualitative study was conducted in the context of a group of students with vision impairments transitioning to a New Zealand university. The findings draw from observations, a researcher diary, focus groups, individual interviews, and data from social media. The study shows that, like their non-disabled peers, the students actively engaged with interactive and collaborative digital technologies to make sense, individually and collectively, of different transition issues before, during and after the first academic trimester of their university journey.

Der Teilbericht 2 enthält alle 31 Technologieberichte, die im Forschungsvorhaben "Technologien für die Energiewende" erstellt wurden. Für jedes Technologiefeld wird der Entwicklungsstatus und der Bedarf an Forschung und Entwicklung dargestellt. Die Bewertung erfolgte mittels 12 Bewertungskriterien, die nach dem klimapolitischen und energiewirtschaftlichen Beitrag der jeweiligen Technologien fragen, die Positionierung deutscher Unternehmen im internationalen Kontext betrachten sowie die Systemkompatibilität bewerten. Hinzu kommen Aspekte der gesellschaftlichen Akzeptanz sowie des Standes von F&E im internationalen Vergleich. Band 2 enthält die Technologieberichte aus den Bereichen Sektorenkopplung, Energie- und Ressourceneffizienz in Gebäuden sowie in der Industrie und integrative Aspekte.

Im Zeitalter der Machine Economy ist der maschinelle Dialog allgegenwärtig - das bietet neue Chancen für Nachhaltigkeit, erhöht gleichzeitig aber durch die zugrundeliegenden Technologien auch den Druck auf unsere Umwelt. Internet of Things (IoT), Künstliche Intelligenz (KI) und Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT) sind das technologische Fundament der Machine Economy. Damit verbunden sind Infrastrukturen, Datenströme und Anwendungen, die hohe Energie- sowie Ressourcenaufwände erzeugen. Der derzeitige politische Diskurs sowie die Nachhaltigkeitsforschung fokussieren sich auf Umweltwirkungen durch digitale Infrastrukturen. Daten, Applikationen sowie die Rolle von Akteuren als Treiber der Umweltwirkung werden zu wenig beleuchtet. In diesem Papier sprechen sich die Autorinnen und Autoren für eine "Grüne Governance der Machine Economy" aus. Adressiert werden Annahmen zu systemübergreifenden Treibern von Umweltbelastungen und ihrer Wirkung. Ziel ist es, ein Gesamtsystem nachhaltiger Entscheidungen und ein ökologisches Zusammenspiel aller beteiligten Technologien in der Wertschöpfung zu ermöglichen. Zukünftige Forschung soll die hier vorgestellten Hypothesen weiter ausarbeiten und konkrete Handlungsoptionen für eine Stakeholder übergreifende Roadmap erarbeiten.

In the process of digitalisation, social administrations are increasingly turning to algorithmic decision support systems. In this particularly controversial field of application of algorithms, we observe efforts to gain public legitimacy for using such systems. In particular, we examine the implementation of the "AMS algorithm" in the Austrian Public Employment Service (AMS). Using the Sociology of Knowledge Approach to Discourse (SKAD), we identify three strategies that shape the development of the AMS discourse: (1) the strategy of placing the algorithm in the discursive field of help and efficiency, (2) the strategy of referential agility of the algorithm, and (3) the strategy of the algorithm's incorporation into the organisation. Our discourse analytic approach shows that the social situatedness of digital technologies contradicts the no- tion of technology as a neutral tool. Second, we find that the AMS occupies an important and supporting position during the discourse. The article argues that organisations undergoing digital transformation are involved in discourses on the use of digital technologies and are central to them as such; they shape discourses and constitute phenomena.

I outline the shifting approaches to digital transformation of the Norwegian e-health sector from the 1970s through the lens of the multi-level perspective and its concept of sociotechnical regime. The digital transformation has taken place through the development, adoption, and use of a huge variety of IT solutions, which also increasingly have become integrated with each other into a complex national e-health infrastructure. This implies that health care institutions become interconnected and interdependent. Accordingly, digital transformation within the health sector needs to be addressed at the national or sector (or industry) level and not just at the organizational level. Digital transformation of health care involves a multitude of actors and stakeholders and is not managed in a hierarchical structure. The various actors have had different ideas and interests related to how the national e-health infrastructure should evolve and how the Norwegian health sector should be transformed. Over time, certain actors coalesce into a constellation that establishes a shared view on how the infrastructure should evolve and how the activities should be organized and governed. My focus is on the nature of different infrastructure regimes and how they interact and are transformed.

This study investigates the dissemination of the open government data concept as processes of change occurring in a globalized world. We use the concept of model travelling from global studies to unfold how open government data as an idea travels across places, especially how the idea in one place is related to changes in other places. We pay attention to the specific ways actors are engaged in the travelling of digital "ideas." Empirically, we follow the travelling of the open government data concept between the UK and China, since 2009. Our finding provides a different picture on how social changes are ordered around open government data, which is different from the modernist or diffusionist view that believes social changes are concerted efforts driven by rational choice and diffuse from a fixated cultural centre to its peripheries. Rather, social changes around technology movements emerge haphazardly among networks of expert enthusiasts committed to the change process by their attraction to the fun and affective atmospheres around these movements. Their centres and peripheries of changes configure organically as the dynamics in the networks of actors evolve; and the directions of change can be multiple and simultaneous.

The construction sector faces multiple challenges such as poor productivity, performance, and competitiveness and has a huge share in global waste production, CO2 emissions, and resource depletion. In this situation, a broad range of public and private stakeholders place their hopes on the digitalisation of construction, in particular, building information modelling (BIM). The article seeks to destabilise the notion of "the" digitalisation in a synchronic and a diachronic perspective. First, we map out the landscape of digital visions regarding the future of construction by examining pertinent academic, public, and professional discourses in recent years. We identify a vision of industrialised construction, a vision of data-based integration, a vision of singularised architecture, a vision of digital sustainability, and an emerging vision of the "twin green and digital transition." In a diachronic perspective, we zoom in to UK "BIM-and-beyond" policy from 2011 to 2021 and show how BIM has evolved from a digital design tool into a critical component for building a national system of data-assets for data-based value creation. In both perspectives, we see a recurring storyline according to which the sector will solve all its problems if it only undertakes the digital transformation.

The objective of the paper is an analysis of the temporal patterns of digitalization. Looking at a specific field, the built environment, and a specific architectural typology, libraries, we ask what has changed in library architecture after 1995 and what types of patterns of progression are evident in this context. Up close, digitalization exhibits more nuanced changes than the catch-all-term suggests. We propose three phases of digitalization: (1) a phase revolving around infinite expansion (1995-2005), (2) a phase revolving around unlimited access (2005-2015), and (3) a phase concerned with encompassing comfort (after 2015). With regard to these refiguration processes, we identify both trajectories, turning points and cyclical patterns. Our study highlights the importance of empirical studies and time-sensitive social research in the context of studies on the digital age.

Cyberangriffe sind zu zentralen Herausforderungen staatlicher Sicherheitspolitiken unserer Zeit geworden. Wie haben sich die Politiken in den Bereichen der Strafverfolgung, der nachrichtendienstlichen sowie militärischen Nutzung des Netzes entwickelt? Welche internationalen sowie domestischen Einflüsse haben die Entwicklungen geprägt? Der Autor geht diesen Fragen nach und analysiert die deutsche und britische Cybersicherheitspolitik seit den späten 1990er Jahren. Er zeigt, dass die Cybersicherheit sowohl die zwischenstaatlichen Beziehungen als auch die Relationen zwischen Regierungen und Bürger*innen beeinflusst.

Algorithms are not to be regarded as a technical structure but as a social phenomenon - they embed themselves, currently still very subtle, into our political and social system. Algorithms shape human behavior on various levels: they influence not only the aesthetic reception of the world but also the well-being and social interaction of their users. They act and intervene in a political and social context. As algorithms influence individual behavior in these social and political situations, their power should be the subject of critical discourse - or even lead to active disobedience and to the need for appropriate tools and methods which can be used to break the algorithmic power.

Mit dem als E-Health bezeichneten Technologiebündel werden für die Organisation Krankenhaus umfassende Transformationen von Geschäftsmodellen und Arbeit anvisiert. Die diskutierten arbeitspolitischen Implikationen auf Qualifikationen und Arbeitsweisen von Ärztinnen und Ärzten schwanken dabei zwischen optimistischen Diagnosen neuer Behandlungsmöglichkeiten und pessimistischen Prognosen über Deprofessionalisierung. Demgegenüber betont der Beitrag die organisationale Verhandelbarkeit des Technikeinsatzes im Krankenhaus. Auf Grundlage qualitativer Interviews mit technischen Entscheiderinnen und Entscheidern sowie Ärztinnen und Ärzten in einem Universitätskrankenhaus und durch Ansätze machttheoretischer Professionstheorien und der Labor Process Theory wird sowohl die (konfliktive) Aushandlung der aktuellen Digitialisierungstechnologien als auch die unterschiedlichen Legitimations- und Einflussstrategien dieser Akteure am Beispiel des digitalen Arztbriefes rekonstruiert. Damit kann nachgezeichnet werden, dass mit der Einführung des digitalen Arztbriefes als Schlüsseltechnologie der E-Health-Strategien eine Unterminierung ärztlicher Handlungsmonopole über den Prozess der Gesundheitsversorgung angestrebt wird - sich diese aber nicht ungebrochen über das ärztliche Professionsinteresse hinwegsetzen kann., The technological bundle known as E-Health aims at a comprehensive transformation of business models and labor processes within hospitals. The discussed implications for qualifications and the work of doctors vary between optimistic diagnoses of new treatment possibilities and pessemistic forceasts involving deprofessionalization. In contrast, this article emphasizes the negotiability of how technology is used in the hospital. Drawing on qualitative interviews with technical decision makers and doctors at a university hospital as well as applying power approaches of a sociology of professions and the Laboor Process Theory, the article attempts to understand the (conflictive) negotiation of current digital technologies as well as different strategies of legitimation and gaining influence of these professional actors. We do this by reconstructing the use of the doctor’s digital letter. It can thus be shown that the introduction of the doctor's digital letter as a key technology in EHealth srategies is intended to undermine doctors' monopoly regarding the healthcare process. Equally, though, we demonstrate that it cannot override the professional interest of them.

What constitutes a data practice and how do contemporary digital media technologies reconfigure our understanding of practices in general? Autonomously acting media, distributed digital infrastructures, and sensor-based media environments challenge the conditions of accounting for data practices both theoretically and empirically. Which forms of cooperation are constituted in and by data practices? And how are human and nonhuman agencies distributed and interrelated in data-saturated environments? The volume collects theoretical, empirical, and historiographical contributions from a range of international scholars to shed light on the current shift from media to data practices.

Der hier vorliegende Report ist das Ergebnis des Teilprojekts "Transformation und Vernetzung städtischer Energieinfrastrukturen", welches Teil des "Rahmenprogramms zur Umsetzung der Energiewende in den Kommunen des Ruhrgebiets - Energiewende Ruhr" ist. Die Transformation der Energieinfrastruktur, in einer Region die noch immer überwiegend auf zentrale Erzeugung und entsprechende Versorgungssysteme ausgerichtet sind, zählt zu den großen Herausforderungen einer gelungenen Energiewende - auch wenn nur ein Teil dieser Herausforderungen in der Region selbst beeinflusst werden kann. Im Rahmen des Teilprojekts wurden zentrale technologisch-infrastrukturelle Herausforderungen im Kontext der Umsetzung der Energiewende im kommunalen Bereich analysiert. Insbesondere war hierbei von Interesse, wie das gezielte Vernetzen unterschiedlicher Infrastrukturbereiche (Strom, Wärme, Verkehr) einen Beitrag dazu leisten kann, Effizienzpotenziale zu heben und damit ein nachhaltiges und zukunftsfähiges Infrastruktursystem zu schaffen. Inhaltlich fokussierten die Analysen auf die Bereiche Kraft-Wärme-Kopplung (KWK) und Wasserstoff. Bislang wurden solche mittel- und langfristigen Transformationsprozesse häufig allein durch technologiebezogene Szenarien und Strategien beschrieben. Der Ansatz erweist sich zunehmend als nicht zielführend, da er sich zu sehr auf einzelne Technologiebereiche beschränkt und das systemische Zusammenspiel zu wenig beleuchtet. Zudem werden weitere Faktoren (Nutzerverhalten, Investitionsentscheidungen, finanzielle Handlungsspielräume auf der Verbraucherseite, Akteursnetzwerke etc.) zumeist nur marginal betrachtet. Im Rahmen des Projekts wurde daher der methodische Zugang einer Cross-Impact-Bilanz gewählt, um diskursiv und partizipatorisch qualitative Zukunftsbilder für die Technologiebereiche zu entwerfen.

Jedes Jahr erleiden 270.000 Menschen in Deutschland einen Schlaganfall. In vielen Fällen können die betroffenen Personen wieder nach Hause zurückkehren und ihr Leben fortführen, benötigen dabei aber ambulante Pflege- und Therapiemaßnahmen. Gerade in ländlichen Regionen bringt dies erhebliche Herausforderungen mit sich, denen sich neue Technologien und die Digitalisierung entgegenstellen. Die Beiträger*innen des Bandes diskutieren erste Ergebnisse des Projekts "DeinHaus 4.0 Oberpfalz" aus interdisziplinärer Sicht, bei dem die Möglichkeit des Einsatzes von Telepräsenzrobotern zur Unterstützung ambulanter Pflege- und Therapiemaßnahmen untersucht wird.

This Research Topic focuses on both strengths and weaknesses of social innovation, technological innovation, and health innovation that are increasingly recognized as crucial concepts related to the formulation of responses to the social, health, and environmental challenges. Goals of this Research Topic: (1) to identify and share the best recent practices and innovations related to social, environmental and health policies; (2) to debate on relevant governance modes, management tools as well as evaluation and impact assessment techniques; (3) to discuss dilemmas in the fields of management, financing, designing, implementing, testing, and maintaining the sustainability of innovative models of delivering social, health and care services; and (4) to recognize and analyze social, technological and health innovation that has emerged or has been scaled-up to respond to crisis situations, for example, a pandemic of the COVID-19 coronavirus disease.

The widespread use of computers and other new information and communication technologies (ICT) in every realm of society has increased the demand for specific skills and competences for people at any age and stage of life to use and work with ICT effectively. Summarised under the terms "digital skills" and "digital competences" by the European Commission in 2018, these concepts still lack clarity and are characterised by some ambiguity though much research has been devoted to them. Given that these two concepts are of high topicality with regard to current labour market developments, like skills mismatch, the digital divide or the design and implementation of occupational retraining programmes, the main purpose of this paper is to contribute to a more clear-cut understanding of the nexus between digital skills/competences and work. To accomplish this goal, we carry out a bibliometric study consisting of both quantitative and qualitative analysis. Our main findings are that research on the nexus between digital skills/competences and work is evolving and this research field is anchored in many different scientific disciplines and shares thematic overlaps with various other areas such as higher education research. The qualitative part of our analysis reveals that this research field is defined by six building blocks with one motor theme on "digital literacy". Furthermore, employment or employability as well as the effects of changing technologies at the workplace are the most crucial topics addressed in this research field, reflecting the high value attributed to digital skills/competences in determining the employability of the current and future workforce.

This article discusses how Automated License Plate Recognition (ALPR) has been implemented in Denmark across three different sectors: parking, environmental zoning, and policing. ALPR systems are deployed as a configuration of cameras, servers, and algorithms of computer vision that automatically reads and records license plates of passing cars. Through digital ethnography and interviews with key stakeholders in Denmark, we contribute to the fields of critical algorithm and surveillance studies with a concrete empirical study on how ALPR systems are configured according to user-specific demands. Each case gives nuance to how ALPR systems are implemented: (1) how the seamless charging for a "barrier-free" parking experience poses particular challenges for customers and companies; (2) how environmental zoning enforcement through automated fines avoids dragnet data collection through customized design and regulation; and (3) how the Danish Police has widened its dragnet data collection with little public oversight and questionable efficacy. We argue that ALPR enacts a form of "banal surveillance" because such systems operate inconspicuously under the radar of public attention. As the central analytic perspective, banality highlights how the demand for increasing efficiency in different domains makes surveillance socially and politically acceptable in the long run. Although we find that legal and civic modes of regulation are important for shaping the deployment of ALPR, the potential for function creep is embedded into the very process of infrastructuring due to a lack of public understanding of these technologies. We discuss wider consequences of ALPR as a specific and overlooked instance of algorithmic surveillance, contributing to academic and public debates around the embedding of algorithmic governance and computer vision into everyday life.

This article introduces Transition 2.0, a paradigm shift designed to study and support students with disabilities' transition to higher education. Transition 2.0 is the result of a qualitative study about how a group of young people with vision impairments used digital technologies for their transition to university. The findings draw from observations, a researcher diary, focus groups, individual interviews, and data from social media. The article discusses a conventional view of transition, referred to here as Transition 1.0, which has dominated disability-related research and service provision in higher education. It counters this view by further developing the conceptual framework for Transition 2.0. The findings expand current conceptual approaches to transition by incorporating in the analysis the role played by digital tools such as social media and mobile devices. They also provide a new lens through which to study and understand student engagement in higher education.

The increasing platformization of urban life needs critical perspectives to examine changing everyday practices and power shifts brought about by the expansion of digital platforms mediating care-services, housing, and mobility. This book addresses new modes of producing urban spaces and societies. It brings both platform researchers and activists from various fields related to critical urban studies and labour activism into dialogue. The contributors engage with the socio-spatial and normative implications of platform-mediated urban everyday life and urban futures, going beyond a rigid techno-dystopian stance in order to include an understanding of platforms as sites of social creativity and exchange.

Innovation is progressively needed in responding to global challenges. Moreover, the increasing complexity of challenges implies demand for the usage of multisectoral and policy mix approaches. Wicked problems can be tackled by "integrated innovation" that combines the coordinated implementation of social, technological, and health innovation co-created by entities of the public sector, the private sector, the non-governmental sector, and the informal sector. This Research Topic focuses on filling the knowledge gaps about the selected types of innovation. First, regarding social innovation that can be understood as new strategies, concepts, products, services, and organizational forms that allow the satisfaction of human needs. Second, a technological innovation that refers to new or remarkably improved products, goods, or services in terms of their technical specifications, components, materials, software, design, or other functional features. Third, health innovation that focuses on novel or enhanced health policies, systems, products, technologies, services, and care delivery schemes to improve people's health. Finally, this Research Topic highlights attempts to develop integrated innovation that can add value to social policy, health policy, and environmental policy by improving efficiency, effectiveness, quality, sustainability, safety, and affordability.

Der Politikbericht ist ein Ergebnis des Forschungsvorhabens "Technologien für die Energiewende", das vom Bundesministerium für Wirtschaft und Energie (BMWi) als Teil des strategischen Leitprojekts "Trends und Perspektiven der Energieforschung" von 2016 bis 2018 gefördert wurde. Er enthält neben einer kurzen deutschen und englischen Einleitung vierseitige Zusammenfassungen zu jedem der 31 analysierten Technologiefelder und eine Kurzdarstellung der Bewertungsmethodik. Die Zusammenfassungen sind gegliedert nach Definition des Technologiefeldes, aktueller Stand der Technologie, ausgewählte Bewertungskriterien und F&E-Empfehlungen.

Der Teilbericht 1 stellt die Methodik dar, die im Forschungsvorhaben "Technologien für die Energiewende" zur multikriteriellen Bewertung von 31 Technologiefeldern verwendet wurde.

In this position paper, we have used Alan Cooper's persona technique to illustrate the utility of audio- and video-based AAL technologies. Therefore, two primary examples of potential audio- and video-based AAL users, Anna and Irakli, serve as reference points for describing salient ethical, legal and social challenges related to use of AAL. These challenges are presented on three levels: individual, societal, and regulatory. For each challenge, a set of policy recommendations is suggested.

Over the past two decades, Africa has become increasingly connected as more and more Africans gained access to the internet and mobile phones. Building on this enhanced connectivity, a new wave of African startups has emerged, tackling some of the continent's biggest challenges with "homemade" digital technologies. There are growing signs that these new technologies could provide a leapfrogging opportunity for Africa. Africa has seen massive improvements in internet access and mobile phone adoption, due to investments in the continent's digital infrastructure, particularly mobile broadband networks. At the same time, there are significant connectivity gaps between Africa and the rest of the world as well as between and within African countries. These may widen as Africa's digital infrastructure faces capacity pressures from a rapidly expanding internet user base. Tech giants, primarily from the United States, have recognised a business opportunity in Africa's existing connectivity gaps and have begun investing heavily in subsea data cables, data centres, and technology hubs. It is critical that these investments bridge Africa's connectivity gaps - a growing body of evidence shows the wide-ranging positive socio-economic impacts of improved internet and mobile phone access. Africa's enhanced connectivity has led to the emergence of a new wave of growth-oriented technology startups, building innovative and "homemade" digital technologies for widespread use. Digital platforms in particular are increasingly disrupting Africa's major, mostly informal service, retail, and agricultural sectors. Anecdotal reports suggest that digital technologies from African startups can be transformative for individuals, businesses, and farms, but there is very little systematic empirical evidence on their local impacts. Such evidence is urgently needed to harness their full potential for inclusive economic development in Africa. As Africa's digitalisation accelerates, African governments

This paper addresses the people’s knowledge, acceptance and attitude towards the concept of the Smart City. Therefore, inhabitants of Leipzig (Germany) and Tallinn (Estonia) were surveyed online and asked to evaluate 10 technologies that can be used in a Smart City and to rate the Smart City concept itself. First, results show significant differences in the level of knowledge and acceptance towards smart technologies between citizens of Leipzig and Tallinn. In addition, the data provides information on the extent to which citizens are willing to live in a Smart City and how they perceive its advantages. Second, the data provides information about perceived opportunities and risks towards the Smart City and thus gives information about which aspects should be addressed in future strategic communication in order to increase the people’s trust and acceptance.

Der Teilbericht 2 enthält alle 31 Technologieberichte, die im Forschungsvorhaben "Technologien für die Energiewende" erstellt wurden. Für jedes Technologiefeld wird der Entwicklungsstatus und der Bedarf an Forschung und Entwicklung dargestellt. Die Bewertung erfolgte mittels 12 Bewertungskriterien, die nach dem klimapolitischen und energiewirtschaftlichen Beitrag der jeweiligen Technologien fragen, die Positionierung deutscher Unternehmen im internationalen Kontext betrachten sowie die Systemkompatibilität bewerten. Hinzu kommen Aspekte der gesellschaftlichen Akzeptanz sowie des Standes von F&E im internationalen Vergleich. Band 1 enthält die Technologieberichte aus den Bereichen Erneuerbare Energien, konventionelle Kraftwerke und Infrastruktur.

Krisen erschüttern die Routinen des gesellschaftlichen Zusammenlebens. Zugleich offenbaren sie, wie Gesellschaften funktionieren, zu welchen Anpassungsleistungen sie fähig sind und über welche Ressourcen sie verfügen. Die Coronakrise hat gezeigt, wie moderne Gesellschaften auf Gesundheitskrisen reagieren und zur Bewältigung mannigfaltige Technologien einsetzen, um in einer Situation der gegenseitigen Bedrohung ihr weiteres Funktionieren sicherzustellen. Der Band widmet sich dieser Rolle von Technologien der Krise in einer theoretischen, normativen und empirischen Perspektive und versammelt Beiträge aus Soziologie, Computer Science, Ethik und Gesundheitswissenschaft.

Dieser Sammelband enthält ausgewählte Beiträge der Jahrestagung des "Forum Privatheit" 2021. Darin werden die aktuelle Herausforderungen analysiert, die durch die Entwicklung der Künstlichen Intelligenz (KI) für Privatheit, informationelle Selbstbestimmung, und Demokratie entstehen und wie diese durch Governancemechanismen adressiert werden können. Die Beiträge fokussieren dabei auf den KI-Einsatz zu Zwecken des Profiling und der Überwachung, auf Fragen der Verbreitung und Entdeckung von Desinformation durch KI sowie die Nutzung von KI im Gesundheits- und Pflegebereich., This volume contains selected papers from the 2021 annual conference affiliated to 'Forum Privatheit', which analyse the current challenges posed by the development of artificial intelligence (AI) to privacy, informational self-determination and democracy, and how they can be addressed through governance mechanisms. The contributions focus on the use of AI for profiling and surveillance purposes, on issues related to the dissemination and detection of disinformation through AI, and on the use of AI in the health and care sectors.

We asked 30 experts to forecast the developmental trajectories of twelve emerging technologies in the United States, Russia, and China until 2040 and to score their possible future impact on arms race stability, crisis stability, and humanitarian principles. The results reveal that, on average, their impact is expected to be negative, with some technologies negatively affecting all three dependent variables. We used a machine learning algorithm to cluster the technologies according to their anticipated impact. This process identified technology clusters comprised of diverse high-impact technologies that share key impact characteristics but do not necessarily share technical characteristics. We refer to these combined effects as ‘negative multiplicity’, reflecting the predominantly negative, concurrent, and in some cases similar, first- and second-order effects that emerging technologies are expected to have on international stability and human security. The expected alignment of the technology development trajectories of the United States, Russia, and China by 2040, in combination with the negative environment created by geopolitical competition, points to a nascent technological arms race that threatens to seriously impede international arms control efforts to regulate emerging technologies.

Um die Forderung, Bürger:innen mehr Spielraum für die Verwendung ihrer Daten einzuräumen, ist eine heftige Diskussion entbrannt. Ist informationelle Selbstbestimmung in Deutschland nur als Anspruch auf jederzeitige Kontrolle über die "eigenen" Daten zu verstehen? Oder lässt sie sich - als informationelle Freiheitsgestaltung - auch aktiver und partizipativer verwirklichen, bis hin zur kommerziellen Nutzung von Daten? Diese Grundsatzfrage wird zusätzlich dadurch brisant, dass Datenschutzregeln zwar existieren, im Netz aber vielfach nicht durchsetzbar sind. Im Buch diskutieren Expert_innen aus Rechts-, Wirtschafts- und Politikwissenschaft sowie Philosophie und Theologie die Positionen der aktuellen Debatte. Dabei werden auch konkurrierende Konzepte wie "digitale Souveränität", "technologische Souveränität" und überhaupt das Phänomen des Rufs nach mehr "Souveränität" in der deutschen und europäischen Digitalpolitik beleuchtet.

Are more solar panels always better in terms of carbon impact for a local energy community, and what is the influence of energy sufficiency? The answer is simple when the national electrical grid is taken as an infinite source of storage. However, this answer becomes uncertain if we consider that exporting power at the national scale is not a desired option. Although this is a conservative hypothesis, it is considered for technical and social reasons. In doing so, load profiles become a key to evaluating the carbon impact of hybrid systems with solar panels plus storage units. To summarize the impact of any load profiles on the optimal sizing of solar panels, we propose a novel index denoted 'natural self-sufficiency'. Our results show that not only reducing energy demand but also being more flexible significantly affects the carbon emissions related to solar panels., Sind mehr Solarmodule immer besser, wenn es um die Kohlenstoffbelastung einer lokalen Energiegemeinschaft geht? Und welchen Einfluss hat die Energiesuffizienz? Die Antwort ist einfach, wenn ein lokales Stromnetz als unendlicher Speicher betrachtet wird. Die Antwort wird jedoch schwieriger, wenn man davon ausgeht, dass die Einspeisung von Strom in ein größeres Netz auf nationaler Ebene nicht die gewünschte Option ist. Obwohl dies eine konservative Hypothese ist, wird sie aus technischen und sozialen Gründen in Betracht gezogen. Unter dieser vorsichtigeren Annahme werden Belastungsprofile zu einem Schlüssel für die Bewertung der Kohlenstoffauswirkungen von Hybridsystemen mit Solarmodulen und Speichereinheiten. Um die Auswirkungen beliebiger Profile auf die optimale Dimensionierung von Solarmodulen zusammenzufassen, schlagen wir einen neuartigen Index vor, der als 'natürliche Autarkie' bezeichnet wird. Unsere Ergebnisse zeigen, dass nicht nur die Verringerung des Energiebedarfs, sondern auch eine größere Flexibilität die Kohlenstoffemissionen im Zusammenhang mit Solarmodulen erheblich beeinflusst.

¿A quién le importamos los ciudadanos? Muchos partidos y sindicatos parecen reducirse a cúpulas que se distribuyen prebendas. Desde la expansión de la videopolítica, la televisión canaliza quejas y críticas sociales a los gobernantes tratándonos como espectadores. Las redes prometen horizontalidad y participación, pero suelen generar movimientos de alta intensidad y corta duración. Nuestras opiniones y comportamientos, capturados por algoritmos, quedan subordinados a corporaciones globalizadas. El espacio público se vuelve opaco y lejano. La desciudadanización se radicaliza, mientras algunos sectores se reinventan y ganan batallas parciales. Pero los usos neoliberales de las tecnologías mantienen y ahondan las desigualdades mayores. ¿Qué alternativas tenemos ante esta desposesión? ¿Disidencias, hackeos? ¿Cuál es el lugar del voto, esa relación entre Estado y sociedad reprogramada por las tecnologías y el mercado?

Research and practice about self-determination in the context of disability has centred on teaching skills and providing support to help people with impairments to be independent. However, limited research exists about the impact of Information and Communication Technologies, in particular social media and mobile devices, on the development of self-determination skills among people with disabilities. This paper presents the findings of a qualitative study which collected data from observations, a researcher diary, focus groups, individual interviews and data from social media. The focus of the study was on young people with vision impairments who were transitioning to university life. The study found that the participants developed self-determination skills by using and adapting collaborative and interactive online tools and mobile devices according to their transition needs. This finding expands the understanding of the implications of new technologies for young people with disabilities’ personal development and the enhancement of self-determination.

In times of digital transformation and in an increasingly fast-paced corporate landscape, there is an increasing debate among company executives as to whether and how artificial intelligence (AI) can take over management tasks or even replace managers as such. This article provides an initial contribution to this discussion by examining the potential user base’s acceptance levels of and expectations for the adoption of AI technology in organizational leadership roles. For this purpose, employees and managers (N = 74) were surveyed in an online questionnaire that presented three hypothetical scenarios in which AI performs certain managerial tasks, featuring different levels of interaction with potential users. An ANOVA analysis showed that the highest acceptance levels among the scenarios were achieved for AI managers that operate as (digital) cognitive assistants, thus giving support to executives in team supervision and providing a data-driven feedback culture., In Zeiten der digitalen Transformation und in einer zunehmend schnelllebigen Unternehmenslandschaft wird unter Führungskräften zunehmend diskutiert, ob und wie Künstliche Intelligenz (KI) Führungsaufgaben übernehmen oder gar Führungskräfte als solche ersetzen kann. Die vorliegende Arbeit leistet einen ersten Beitrag zu dieser Diskussion, indem sie die Akzeptanz und die Erwartungen der potenziellen Nutzerbasis an den Einsatz von KI-Technologie in organisatorischen Führungsaufgaben untersucht. Zu diesem Zweck wurden Mitarbeiter und Führungskräfte (N = 74) mittels eines Onlinefragebogens befragt. Dieser stellt drei hypothetische Szenarien vor, in denen KI bestimmte Führungsaufgaben übernimmt, wobei die Szenarien unterschiedliche Ebenen der Interaktion mit potenziellen Nutzern aufweisen. Eine ANOVA-Analyse zeigte, dass die höchsten Akzeptanzwerte unter den Szenarien für KI-Manager erzielt wurden, die als (digitale) kognitive Assistenten agieren und so Führungskräfte bei der Teambetreuung unterstützen sowie eine datengetriebene Feedbackkultur bieten.

With the publication of the Data Act proposal in February 2022, the European Commission approached an important milestone in the implementation of the data strategy it had announced two years earlier. The legislative proposal includes a package of measures that are supposed to make more IoT data available to data-driven enterprises. The legislation is expected to bring about more competition in the aftermarkets for IoT devices and related services, more value generation from such data and more techno-logical innovation enabled by access to data. The most innovative and far-reaching regulative instrument applied in this context is, without doubt, the mandatory access rights regime that would facilitate flow of data from private (mostly large) enterprises to other (mostly smaller) enterprises and to the public sector. This regime is accompanied by rules about the necessity and content of commercial contracts that define private entitlements concerning access to as well as use of co-generated IoT data, including statutory requirements concerning fairness, non-discrimination and compensation. This Position Paper primarily addresses the access rights regime and its accompanying rules focusing on contracts regarding access to data. It also briefly touches upon the provisions on data portability, rules for switching between providers and trade secrets. We conclude that the consolidated impact of the access rights regime on IoT device manufacturers, third parties and the data economy at large is hard to predict. At the same time, we argue that the legal positions and entitlements the Data Act would create require further scrutiny and that there is certainly room for clarifications and im-provements in the legislative proposal. The analysis concludes with several specific recommendations.

Die Technologien der Digitalen Gesundheit werden die Beziehungsarbeit in der Pflege und die sozialen Beziehungen des alternden Menschen grundlegend transformieren. Der Band widmet sich drei ethisch-rechtlichen Spannungsfeldern. Im Spannungsfeld von Personenwürde und digitalisierter Pflege geht es um den Ausgleich individueller Vorstellungen vom guten Leben mit jenen der digitalisierten Technologien. So ermöglichen neue Informationstechnologien sowohl mehr Selbstbestimmung, aber auch eine lückenlosere Kontrolle des Alltagslebens. Analog kann Technik im Spannungsfeld von Freiheit und Sicherheit einen Aspekt auf Kosten des anderen verstärken. Zuletzt geht es im Spannungsfeld von Simulation und Authentizität um die menschlichen Folgen der Konstruktion von Wirklichkeit., The technologies of 'digital health' will fundamentally transform the building of relationships in healthcare and the social relationships of ageing people. This volume is devoted to three ethical and legal areas of tension. In the area of tension between personal dignity and digital care, it is a question of balancing individual ideas about a good life with those of digitised technologies. In this way, new information technologies enable both more self-determination and more complete control over everyday life. Analogously, in the area of tension between freedom and security, technology can reinforce one aspect at the expense of the other. Finally, the area of tension between simulation and authenticity revolves around the human consequences of the construction of reality.

Digitalization in the field of education for sustainable development (ESD) has gained attention in the last decade. In particular, technologies such as augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR) offer new ways to deliver educational content on sustainable development by simulating real-world experiences and using immersive and interactive formats for learning. Using an explorative qualitative research approach, the benefits of AR and VR technologies in the context of ESD are assessed. The results of a first expert panel show that AR and VR technologies are particularly suitable for sustainability topics when an understanding of action and the transfer of knowledge and values are to be promoted among learners., Die Digitalisierung im Bereich der Bildung für nachhaltige Entwicklung (BNE) hat in den letzten zehn Jahren an Aufmerksamkeit gewonnen. Besonders Technologien wie Augmented Reality (AR) und Virtual Reality (VR) bieten neue Möglichkeiten, Bildungs-inhalte zur nachhaltigen Entwicklung zu vermitteln, indem sie reale Erfahrungen simulieren und immersive sowie interaktive Formate für das Lernen nutzen. Mittels eines explorativen qualitativen Forschungsansatzes werden die Vorteile von AR- und VR-Technologien im Kontext von BNE untersucht. Ergebnisse eines kleinen Expertenpanels zeigen, dass AR- und VR-Technologien für nachhaltige Themen dann besonders geeignet sind, wenn ein Handlungsverständnis und der Transfer von Wissen und Werten bei Lernenden gefördert werden soll.