Handbook of Critical Studies of Artificial Intelligence

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Handbook of Critical Studies of Artificial Intelligence

9781803928555 Edward Elgar Publishing
Edited by Simon Lindgren, Professor of Sociology and Director, DIGSUM Centre for Digital Social Research, Umeå University, Sweden
Publication Date: 2023 ISBN: 978 1 80392 855 5 Extent: 940 pp
As artificial intelligence (AI) continues to seep into more areas of society and culture, critical social perspectives on its technologies are more urgent than ever before. Bringing together state-of-the-art research from experienced scholars across disciplines, this Handbook provides a comprehensive overview of the current state of critical AI studies.

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Critical Acclaim
Contributors
Contents
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As artificial intelligence (AI) continues to seep into more areas of society and culture, critical social perspectives on its technologies are more urgent than ever before. Bringing together state-of-the-art research from experienced scholars across disciplines, this Handbook provides a comprehensive overview of the current state of critical AI studies.

Moving beyond narrow technological definitions of AI, the Handbook provides readers with an in-depth understanding of its social, ethical, and political implications. Chapters cover a broad range of timely issues related to AI, including the risk of bias and discrimination in its systems, its impact on democracy and governance, concerns surrounding privacy and surveillance, and the use of its technologies in decision-making processes. Underscoring the urgent need for deeper critical analyses of AI, the Handbook constitutes a major contribution to the ongoing discussion about what critical studies of AI can entail, what questions they may pose, and what concepts they can offer to address them.

Rich in theoretical and empirical analysis, this cutting-edge Handbook will prove an invaluable resource for students and scholars of digital sociology and science and technology studies. Its extensive coverage of this emerging field will also appeal to practitioners, developers, and policymakers seeking orientation in the complex social and political dynamics of AI.
Critical Acclaim
‘I highly and unreservedly recommend this excellent Handbook. It emerges as an indispensable text for those immersed in digital sociology, science and technology studies and blends rich theoretical insights with empirical analyses. It is a vital resource for anyone keen to critically explore the complex relationship between AI and society.’
– Jürgen Rudolph, Journal of Applied Learning & Teaching

‘I highly and unreservedly recommend this excellent Handbook. It emerges as an indispensable text for those immersed in digital sociology, science and technology studies and blends rich theoretical insights with empirical analyses. It is a vital resource for anyone keen to critically explore the complex relationship between AI and society.’
– Jürgen Rudolph, Journal of Applied Learning & Teaching

‘AI is not only technology; it also means power. In times when AI ethics is often closely aligned with big tech and when AI teams are expelled or undervalued, a critical view of AI is much needed. Addressing a diversity of aspects from political economy to sociotechnological imaginaries and activism, this Handbook offers a range of critical scholarship on AI that shows how AI is entangled with the social structures and power relations in society. A welcome antidote to the ideologies of technological optimism, technodeterminism, and technosolutionism, and great support for the critical and interdisciplinary project of developing technology that contributes to, rather than undermines, conviviality and the common good.’
– Mark Coeckelbergh, University of Vienna, Austria

‘AI has proliferated in everyday life. Virtual assistants such as Alexa and Siri are present on our phones and in our homes. More and more people use robotic lawnmowers and robot hoovers. There are bots on the Internet that post, comment, and like. Robots and AI have changed the world of work. ChatGPT has given us an impression of how online search could look like in the future. The world’s largest military forces are investing heavily into the development of AI. We need to better understand what impacts AI has on society. For doing so, we need critical theories and analysis of AI. The Handbook of Critical Studies of Artificial Intelligence provides 76 chapters that help us to better understand what it means to critically study AI in society. This book is excellent reading for everyone interested in AI & society.’
– Christian Fuchs, Paderborn University, Germany
Contributors
Contributors: Kendra Albert, Fernando Avila Vian Bakir, Andrea Ballatore, Caroline Bassett, Andreas Beinsteiner, Anton Berg, Sukanto Bhattacharya, Abeba Birhane, Peter Bloom, Saba Rebecca Brause, Benedetta Brevini, Laila Brown, Manuel Carabantes, Vanja Carlsson, Janet Chan, Simona Chiodo, Ching-Hua Chuan, Coppélie Cocq, Randy Connolly, Karin Danielsson, Maggie Delano, Virginia Dignum, Anne Dippel, Lina Eklund, Niva Elkin-Koren, Severin Engelmann, Kalle Eriksson, Eran Fisher, Johnathan Flowers, Anna Foka, Maria Forsgren, Eleonore Fournier-Tombs, João Gonçalves, Dejan Grba, Gabriele Griffin, Jens Hälterlein, Kelly Hannah-Moffat, Jenna Imad Harb, Kashyap Haresamudram, Fredrik Heintz, Rasmus Helles, Kathryn Henne, Jan Hjelte, Steve G. Hoffman, Wolfgang Hofkirchner, Charlotte Högberg, Robert Holton, Andre Holzapfel, Stefka Hristova, Anna Jobin, Walter G. Johnson, Fabrice Jotterand, Kaisla Kajava, Christian Katzenbach, Miroslav Kotásek, Hans-Jörg Kreowski, Salla-Maaria Laaksonen, Amanda Lagerkvist, Signe Sophus Lai, Yucong Lao, Stefan Larsson, Megan LePere-Schloop, Ashlin Lee, Evelina Liliequist, Simon Lindgren, Janina Loh (neé Sombetzki), Stine Lomborg, Anders Sundnes Løvlie, Fenwick McKelvey, Andrew McStay, Samuel Merrill, Shintaro Miyazaki, Markus Naarttijärvi, Simone Natale, Axel Nyström, Carl Öhman, Emily Öhman, Andreas Öjehag-Pettersson, Chinasa T. Okolo, Will Orr, Juho Pääkkönen, Guy Paltieli, Orestis Papakyriakopoulos, Jaana Parviainen, Maayan Perel, Arun Teja Polcumpally, Ana Pop Stefanija, Lina Rahm, Tyler Reigeluth, Bo Reimer, Anais Resseguier, Vanessa Richter, Jonathan Roberge, Ben Roberts, Malin Rönnblom, Rinat Rosenberg-Kima, Carrie B. Sanders, Nitin Sawhney, Mike S. Schäfer, Daniel S. Schiff, Robyn Schimmer, Ralph Schroeder, Kasia Söderlund, James Steinhoff, Andreas Stenling, Michael Strange, Andreas Sudmann, Annika Svensson, Susanne Tafvelin, Zeerak Talat, Scott Timcke, Vicenç Torra, Andrea Aler Tubella, Jason Tucker, Katja Valaskivi, Pieter Verdegem, Mario Verdicchio, Rosalie A. Waelen, Ina Weber, Mikael Wiberg, Tanja Wiehn, Harry Yaojun Yan, Kai-Cheng Yang, Mike Zajko, Jing Zeng, Sandy Zook
Contents
Contents:

1 Introducing critical studies of artificial intelligence 1
Simon Lindgren

PART I AI AND CRITICAL THEORY: CONCEPTUAL DISCUSSIONS
2 Recursive power: AI governmentality and technofutures 21
Fenwick McKelvey and Jonathan Roberge
3 The danger of smart ideologies: counter-hegemonic intelligence and
antagonistic machines 33
Peter Bloom
4 The becoming of AI: a critical perspective on the contingent formation of AI 43
Anna Jobin and Christian Katzenbach
5 Artificial intelligence and the problem of radical uncertainty 56
Robert Holton
6 Trading human autonomy for technological automation 67
Simona Chiodo
7 Automation anxiety: a critical history – the apparently odd recurrence of
debates about computation, AI and labour 79
Caroline Bassett and Ben Roberts
8 AI, critical knowledge and subjectivity 94
Eran Fisher
9 Habits and habitus in algorithmic culture 108
Stefka Hristova
10 Algorithms and emerging forms of intimacy 117
Tanja Wiehn
11 It’s incomprehensible: on machine learning and decoloniality 128
Abeba Birhane and Zeerak Talat
12 Pragmatism and AI: a critical approach 141
Johnathan Flowers
13 Digital humanism and AI 152
Wolfgang Hofkirchner and Hans-Jörg Kreowski
14 Beyond AI solutionism: toward a multi-disciplinary approach to artificial intelligence in society 163
Simon Lindgren and Virginia Dignum
15 Artificial intelligence and social memory: towards the cyborgian
remembrance of an advancing mnemo-technic 173
Samuel Merrill
16 Making sense of AI-influenced geopolitics using STS theories 187
Arun Teja Polcumpally

PART II AI IMAGINARIES AND DISCOURSES
17 Bothering the binaries: unruly AI futures of hauntings and hope at the limit 199
Amanda Lagerkvist and Bo Reimer
18 Imaginaries of artificial intelligence 209
Vanessa Richter, Christian Katzenbach and Mike Schäfer
19 Language of algorithms: agency, metaphors and deliberations in AI discourses 224
Kaisla Kajava and Nitin Sawhney
20 Technological failures, controversies and the myth of AI 237
Andrea Ballatore and Simone Natale
21 Marking the lines of artificial intelligence 245
Mario Verdicchio
22 The critical potential of science fiction 254
Miroslav Kotásek
23 A critical review of news framing of artificial intelligence 266
Ching-Hua Chuan
24 Media representations of artificial intelligence: surveying the field 277
Saba Rebecca Brause, Jing Zeng, Mike S. Schäfer and Christian Katzenbach
25 Educational imaginaries of AI 289
Lina Rahm

PART III THE POLITICAL ECONOMY OF AI: DATAFICATION AND SURVEILLANCE
26 Critical AI studies meets critical political economy 302
Pieter Verdegem
27 The industry of automating automation: the political economy of the
AI industry 312
James Steinhoff
28 AI, class societies and the social life of reason 323
Scott Timcke
29 Re-imagining democracy: AI’s challenge to political theory 333
Guy Paltieli
30 AI as automated inequality: statistics, surveillance and discrimination 343
Mike Zajko
31 Digital tracking and infrastructural power 354
Stine Lomborg, Rasmus Helles and Signe Sophus Lai
32 AI and the everyday political economy of global health 367
Michael Strange and Jason Tucker
33 Addressing global inequity in AI development 378
Chinasa T. Okolo

PART IV AI TRANSPARENCY, ETHICS AND REGULATION
34 A critical approach to AI ethics 391
Rosalie A. Waelen
35 Power and inequalities: lifting the veil of ignorance in AI ethics 402
Anais Resseguier
36 Barriers to regulating AI: critical observations from a fractured field 413
Ashlin Lee, Will Orr, Walter G. Johnson, Jenna Imad Harb and Kathryn Henne
37 Why artificial intelligence is not transparent: a critical analysis of its three
opacity layers 424
Manuel Carabantes
38 How to critique the GDPR: when data protection is turned against the
working class 435
Carl Öhman
39 Four facets of AI transparency 445
Stefan Larsson, Kashyap Haresamudram, Charlotte Högberg, Yucong Lao, Axel Nyström, Kasia Söderlund and Fredrik Heintz
40 An inclusive approach to ascribing responsibility in robot ethics 456
Janina Loh
41 Machines and morals: moral reasoning ability might indicate how close
AI is to attaining true equivalence with human intelligence 470
Sukanto Bhattacharya
42 A women’s rights perspective on safe artificial intelligence inside the
United Nations 481
Eleonore Fournier-Tombs
43 From ethics to politics: changing approaches to AI education 493
Randy Connolly
44 The transparency of reason: ethical issues of AI art 504
Dejan Grba

PART V AI BIAS, NORMATIVITY AND DISCRIMINATION
45 Learning about human behavior? The transcendental status of grammars
of action in the processing of HCI data 516
Andreas Beinsteiner
46 Algorithmic moderation: contexts, perceptions, and misconceptions 528
João Gonçalves and Ina Weber
47 Algorithmic exclusion 538
Kendra Albert and Maggie Delano
48 Prospective but disconnected partners: AI-informed criminal risk prediction 549
Kelly Hannah-Moffat and Fernando Avila
49 Power asymmetries, epistemic imbalances and barriers to knowledge: the (im)possibility of knowing algorithms 563
Ana Pop Stefanija
50 Gender, race and the invisible labor of artificial intelligence 573
Laila Brown
51 Machine learning normativity as performativity 584
Tyler Reigeluth
52 Queer eye on AI: binary systems versus fluid identities 595
Karin Danielsson, Andrea Aler Tubella, Evelina Liliequist and Coppélie Cocq
53 Representational silence and racial biases in commercial image recognition services in the context of religion 607
Anton Berg and Katja Valaskivi
54 Social media as classification systems: procedural normative choices in
user profiling 619
Severin Engelmann and Orestis Papakyriakopoulos
55 From hate speech recognition to happiness indexing: critical issues in
datafication of emotion in text mining 631
Salla-Maaria Laaksonen, Juho Pääkkönen and Emily Öhman

PART VI POLITICS AND ACTIVISM IN AI
56 Democratic friction in speech governance by AI 643
Niva Elkin-Koren and Maayan Perel
57 Automating empathy: overview, technologies, criticism 656
Andrew McStay and Vian Bakir
58 Ideational tensions in the Swedish automation debate: initial findings 670
Kalle Eriksson
59 En-countering AI as algorhythmic practice 682
Shintaro Miyazaki
60 Introducing political ecology of Creative-Ai 691
Andre Holzapfel

PART VII AI AND AUTOMATION IN SOCIETY
61 Automated decision-making in the public sector 705
Vanja Carlsson, Malin Rönnblom and Andreas Öjehag-Pettersson
62 The landscape of social bot research: a critical appraisal 716
Harry Yaojun Yan and Kai-Cheng Yang
63 Introducing robots and AI in human service organizations: what are the implications for employees and service users? 726
Susanne Tafvelin, Jan Hjelte, Robyn Schimmer, Maria Forsgren, Vicenc Torra and Andreas Stenling
64 Critically analyzing autonomous materialities 737
Mikael Wiberg
65 Exploring critical dichotomies of AI and the Rule of Law 749
Markus Naarttijärvi
66 The use of AI in domestic security practices 763
Jens Hälterlein
67 Methodological reflections on researching the sociotechnical imaginaries
of AI in policing 773
Carrie B. Sanders and Janet Chan
68 Emergence of artificial intelligence in health care: a critical review 783
Annika M. Svensson and Fabrice Jotterand
69 The politics of imaginary technologies: innovation ecosystems as political choreographies for promoting care robotics in health care 793
Jaana Parviainen
70 AI in education: landscape, vision and critical ethical challenges in the
21st century 804
Daniel S. Schiff and Rinat Rosenberg-Kima
71 Critically assessing AI/ML for cultural heritage: potentials and challenges 815
Anna Foka, Lina Eklund, Anders Sundnes Løvlie and Gabriele Griffin
72 AI ethnography 826
Anne Dippel and Andreas Sudmann
73 Automating social theory 845
Ralph Schroeder
74 Artificial intelligence and scientific problem choice at the nexus of industry
and academia 859
Steve G. Hoffman
75 Myths, techno solutionism and artificial intelligence: reclaiming AI
materiality and its massive environmental costs 869
Benedetta Brevini
76 AI governance and civil society: the need for critical engagement 878
Megan LePere-Schloop and Sandy Zook

Index 891




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