If Foucault were more a materialist, how might he have thought about this crash-site-turned-memorial? (featured above — full background story here)

In the past, we have written about an infrastructural model of the state as composed of leftovers, specifically, when we wrote about derelict Olympic stadiums in Athens and London, residual separation of city infrastructures found in Berlin, and whether or not the durability of state projects (and the resulting leftovers they proffer) is such a good thing (as so much STS on stabilization might very well imply). What’s the infrastructure link to the state? Its simple. Foucault and especially his followers suggested that there was no such thing as the state; instead there was another thing and this other thing was called “stateness,” which is thought roughly to be captured in this form of argument: the state is not a thing; the state is, at best, at effect. Sure, sure, some governmentality scholars have discussed “institutions” and “political regimes,” but, at the highest level of abstraction, Foucault was reacting to Hobbes-like actor-models of the state and responded by rejecting those models in favor of seeing the state not as the cause but as the effect of micro-physical, bio-political techniques for self-discipline and other forms of coercion. In effect, Foucault is saying the state is the residual after effect. Put another way, the state is leftover; it is to be found amongst the leftovers. Of course, we, as material-semiotic mongrels, would see the state as a residual material after effect, but that’s another argument entirely.

Residual material after effects take all manner of forms, and today I happened upon one, which was both, in and of itself, interesting, but also a compelling case of “leaving behind” that might be relevant to developing a “leftover” perspective regarding infrastructure. This is of double interest to our infrastructure gurus because the infrastructure of the memorial is also memorializing the infrastructure that is the plane (that crashed) so they make leftovers of the leftovers.

The full story is here and here, but a quick summary is: UTA Flight 772 routinely flew from Brazzaville (now in DRC) to Paris CDG airport, when, on Tuesday, 19 September 1989, a bomb exploded aboard the plane causing it to crash in Niger about an hour after take-off. 18 years later, family and friends of the victims aboard the plane returned to the crash site and because of its outstanding remoteness, many of the pieces of the plane were still there, only slightly covered in sand. Funded by a grant from Libya, the remains were transformed into a memorial, further extending the site into the future.

Surely, there is a good deal of literature on memorialization in anthropology and geography along with the practical literature in the arts and architecture on the topic. However, our interest is more into what these “remnants” and their extension into the future means for theories of the state sensitive to infrastructure. While this case is only tertiarily related, there is something elegant about extending ruins; making them more durable through memorialization.

Image from: <http://cdn.viralnova.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/34-iQoqN4P.jpg&gt;

The quote from Žižek is just too good not to re-post.

Fascinating view into the Walled City, Kowloon, where more than 50,000 live in only a few square blocks. Click here for the short, but intense story.

<image from: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2139914/A-rare-insight-Kowloon-Walled-City.html&gt;

Mark Neocleous on police power and no-fly zones.

Upcoming Event on Infrastructure

Fascinating discussion of waste coming very soon; I’ve always wondered what waste infrastructure and wasteful infrastructure might add to this discussion (but from an STS perspective, which would add to the political ecology, resource geography, and environmental justice approaches).

A thank you, which is long overdue(!), to guest blogger Stefanie Fishel.

Looking back, her great posts on “thinking with the body,” which played with a comment that Jan and I made at the Millennium conference about STS being a “cabinet of curiosities,” is a favorite for me, along with “The Bodies Politic,” are all good reminders of the rich interface possible between international relations and science and technology studies.

Stefanie also a fresh new article out: “Theorizing violence in the Responsibility to Protect” (Critical Studies on Security, Volume 1, Issue 2, 2013, Special Issue: Late Warfare), check it out!

A quick plug for Stefanie from when we introduced her earlier this year:

Stefanie Fishel received her doctorate in Political Science from Johns Hopkins University and a Master’s degree in International Relations from the University of Victoria. Dr. Fishel approaches International Relations using techniques and inspirations from Science, Technology, and Society (STS) studies, the philosophy of science, and biology. She is currently at Colgate University in their Peace and Conflict Studies area.

I met Stefanie at the 2012 Millennium Conference at the London School of Economics during a post-conference workshop about how actor-network theory and international relations might fit together (if at all). Andrew Barry was the keynote speaker. In all, it was great.

In her LSE talk, “Lively Vessels and Contaminated States: Biological Metaphor and Global Politics” Stephanie described … well, I’ll let her fill you in over the next month.

Join us in welcoming Stefanie to the blog!

In the New York Times this morning (September 9, 2013), a terrific article (written September 8, 2013) explores a development in China’s plans for urban development and the displacement of rural inhabitant.

“Leaving the Land” is a new series in NYT, and “Articles in this series look at how China’s government-driven effort to push the population to towns and cities is reshaping a nation that for millenniums has been defined by its rural life”, which can also be read in Chinese, fittingly).

The third piece, “Picking Death Over Eviction,” explores rural resistance to government-based programs to urbanize rural citizens, including a graphic opening passage about a young woman who refuses to have her small shop removed by a demolition crew set to level it, drenches herself in diesel fuel and lights a match. According to the journalist, “Besides the self-immolations, farmers have killed themselves by other means to protest land expropriation.”

For STS scholars, the link between infrastructural expansion/transformation and social protest, the bread-and-butter of traditional/conventional sociology, seems like an obviously good research site for mutually beneficial scholarship, potentially even for those individuals being displaced through the advanced justification of infrastructural expansion … after all, it appears that this change is not poised to slow for many years: “In China, the timeline for moving 250 million rural residents into cities by 2025 is so rapid and far-reaching that it is raising concerns that some people will be left behind” … so, it is a sad, unfortunate case, but one rich for considering “infrastructural controversies” (controversies being a mainstay in STS) and “social protest” (protest being a mainstay in sociology).

After a long summer hiatus wherein Jan-H and I were hard at work on a few new publications, we have returned to blogging for the (in the US, anyways) fall semester. We will share excerpts from our new work and invite a few new guest bloggers to share the stage with us as we consider the role of infrastructure in supporting (or up-ending) (social) order.

The American Society for Civil Engineering has created a nifty interactive website about the state of infrastructure in America at http://www.infrastructurereportcard.org/.

The website is appealing to look at and intuitive to use if you’re curious about, in this case, how poor American infrastructure really is in the late 2000s and early 2010s. Bottom-line: America gets a failing grade, but only-just-failing at a D+.

For STS scholars, this might be one of those great cases in the rough that could bring the “assessment” or “accounting” literature together with infrastructure studies given that the infrastructures must be defined in order to be counted and compared, and, as such, provides a right backdrop upon with some solid STS-oriented research could start from … and STSers will no doubt love this “grading rubric” available at the sight to legitimize and justify the grading standards. Also, of particular interest to scholars like Jan-Hendrik and I (along with our friends Stefanie Fishel (guest blogger emeritus), Govind Gopakumar, Kathryn Furlong (also guest blogger emeritus), and Patrick Carroll, there is a section that breaks-up scores according to states … nice, no?

In all, this is one of the places where an STS orientation might just be of serious government interest again …

*This is, in some ways, Stefanie‘s post, because she found it. Here goes, anyways:

One of our longstanding understandings of infrastructure is that it facilitates and supports something else, but, in these discussions, we almost never discuss music (even though Jan has written extensively on the topic). When I think of music infrastructure, I typically think like a sociologist and come-up with ideas like those in this website about linking together musicians, studio owners, and show venues or infrastructure as constituting the business and legal environment music is embedded in.

However, composer, pianist and software engineer Stephen Malinowski has me thinking another way about music infrastructure, in particular, about visualization infrastructure for audio stuff. Now, music visualizers are nothing new. In fact, off-the-shelf software installed on most computers is capable of it.

National Public Radio in the states covered this story about music visualization infrastructure featuring Malinowski. The title, “Watch A Mind-Blowing Visualization Of ‘The Rite Of Spring'” is pretty accurate in my opinion. Similar to overcoming the problem of getting pseudo-instruments into the hands of millions (a la Guitar Hero and MIT’s Media Lab),

Stephen Malinowski has created one brilliant solution to an age-old problem: how to communicate and understand what’s going on in a piece of music, particularly if you don’t know standard musical notation.

The visualization infrastructure is fairly basic at this point, and, as Malinowski admits, he is only at the beginning of his ability to render music (with his imagination being one of the only limitations). Still, his “music animation machine” is a pretty fascinating case of infrastructural development. Enjoy!

Postdoctoral Fellow in Infrastructure Studies, University of Michigan

The University of Michigan announces an eleven-month postdoctoral fellowship position. The position will start September 1, 2013.

Salary: $50-60,000 per year (depending on negotiated duties), plus a competitive benefits package, $5,000 in discretionary funding, and the opportunity to appoint and supervise one or more paid undergraduate research assistants to work on projects of your choice.

To apply:

Candidates should submit the following materials electronically to Prof. Christian Sandvig

Email one PDF file which includes:

• A statement of interest describing your relevant background and skills
• A current curriculum vitae
• The name and contact information for three references. (One reference should be your doctoral advisor.) Letters of recommendation will only be solicited from finalists.
• Two publications or other writing samples
• Review of applications will begin immediately and continue until the position is filled.

Position Description

The Department of Communication Studies (in the College of Literature, Science, and the Arts) and the School of Information are jointly offering a postdoctoral fellow position in the multidisciplinary area of “infrastructure studies.”

The addition of information technology is transforming the way society provides important infrastructures, including those that support media, telecommunications, power, and transport, but also those that support knowledge, culture, and scientific data. Thanks to new capabilities in computing and control, every year our infrastructures claim to be “smarter,” with new capacities for distributed processing, analysis, sensing, adapting, and autonomous self-improvement. This radical transformation is well underway, but the assessment of its consequences is still in its infancy. For example, infrastructure unevenly distributes benefits and capabilities, with complex and sometimes unforeseen implications for politics, economics, knowledge, and social justice (to name just a few domains). This position will fund a researcher who will have the opportunity to work alongside senior collaborators to define and shape this new area of scholarship.

Qualifications:

The successful applicant will have completed the Ph.D. in a related area by the start date with a dissertation related to information and/or media infrastructures, broadly defined. The ideal candidate may be trained in science & technology studies, information science, media theory, computer-supported collaborative work, and/or human-computer interaction. Applicants should have some familiarity with qualitative research methods. Applicants who also have some technical background related to the infrastructure(s) they study are of particular interest, but this is not required.

This position is jointly sponsored by two academic units located on adjacent floors of the same building. The postdoctoral fellow will have office space in the Department of Communication Studies and may have the opportunity to teach one course in the School of Information (to be negotiated). The postdoctoral fellow will pursue his or her own independent research agenda, but will also be expected to collaborate with the faculty on the convening committee (listed below).

The postdoctoral fellow will be an equal member of the research group. S/he will be expected not only to conduct independent research, but also to collaborate actively in joint research projects with faculty, graduate students, and undergraduate research assistants. This responsibility includes regular communication and coordination with the project team. The postdoc will also be expected to contribute substantially to publications related to “infrastructure studies,” acting as first author on some and as a secondary author on others.

Convening committee:

Prof. Christian Sandvig (chair)
Prof. Carl Lagoze
Prof. Paul N. Edwards

Please feel free to contact any member of the convening committee with questions about this position. As mentioned above, please send application materials to the search committee and not to individual committee members.

Non-Discrimination Policy Notice

The University of Michigan, as an equal opportunity/affirmative action employer, complies with all applicable federal and state laws regarding nondiscrimination and affirmative action. The University of Michigan is committed to a policy of equal opportunity for all persons and does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, national origin, age, marital status, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, disability, religion, height, weight, or veteran status in employment, educational programs and activities, and admissions. Inquiries or complaints may be addressed to the Senior Director for Institutional Equity, and Title IX/Section 504/ADA Coordinator, Office of Institutional Equity, 2072 Administrative Services Building, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48109-1432, 734-763-0235, TTY 734-647-1388. For other University of Michigan information call 734-764-1817.

you too can own a tank.

via you too can own a tank.