New Open Access Research

Our new edited book, Information, Technology and Control in a Changing World: Understanding Power Structures in the 21st Century, is available for purchase and includes three open-access chapters, two of which are the Introduction (co-authored with Blayne Haggart and Natasha Tusikov) and one of the foundational theoretical chapters for the book (written by Blayne Haggart).

My chapter, Surveillance in the Name of Governance: Aadhaar as a Fix for Leaking Systems in India, is also free to access, the abstract for which is:

Many jurisdictions are employing biometric technologies to collect data about and verify the identities of social assistance recipients, with fraud prevention and cost savings serving as common justifications for doing so. This chapter explores the practices of building the infrastructure to monitor welfare beneficiaries, many of whom are vulnerable or marginalised populations. Through an examination of the Aadhaar system in India, which has issued over one billion unique identification numbers since being launched in 2010, the analysis illustrates a one-way expectation of knowledge and transparency (i.e., for citizens to disclose in order to access services). It also draws attention to how nationalist agendas and forms of inequality inform who is subject to the state’s terms and conditions. Findings illustrate how these forms of surveillance evince broader shifts in which state and non-state actors rely on knowledge to regulate subjects.