Data Justice Lab

The Data Justice Lab is a space for research and collaboration at Cardiff University’s School of Journalism, Media and Culture (JOMEC). It seeks to advance a research agenda that examines the intricate relationship between datafication and social justice, highlighting the politics and impacts of data-driven processes and big data. The lab is directed by Dr Lina Dencik, Dr Arne Hintz, and Dr Joanna Redden.

Our research examines the implications of institutional and organizational uses of data and provides critical responses to potential data harms and misuses. Areas of research include (but are not limited to): Data discrimination, digital labour, prediction and preemption, data ethics, algorithmic governance, social justice-informed design, uses of data by social justice groups, data-related activism and advocacy.

Read an interview with one of the co-directors about the lab for JOMEC’s flagship magazine YouButey!: YouButey_Mayissue.

To find out more about the Data Justice Lab team, check the People page.

Data Justice

The collection and processing of massive amounts of data is becoming an increasingly contentious issue. Our financial transactions, communications, movements, relationships, and interactions with government all increasingly generate data that are used to profile and sort groups and individuals. With the ‘platformisation’ of digital media alongside governmental and corporate uses of citizen data, developments in the Internet of Things, smart homes and smart cities, the systematic collection and analysis of massive data sets across our social life is being normalised and entrenched – what has been described as the ‘datafication’ of society. These processes can affect both individuals as well as entire communities that may be denied services and access to opportunities, or wrongfully targeted and exploited. In short, they impact on our ability to participate in society.

With the emergence of this data paradigm comes a new set of power dynamics requiring investigation and critique. Whilst promises of value-neutral information and possibilities for prediction are said to advance better responses to a range of social problems, they may also have serious implications for social inclusion, autonomy, basic freedoms, and established notions of ethics, trust, responsibility and accountability.

The term ‘data justice’ is intended to advance a research agenda that examines the intricate relationship between datafication and social justice by foregrounding and highlighting the politics and impacts of data-driven processes and big data. The lab brings together our interests in digital media, social justice, and data power and builds on our existing research and activity in these areas.

Data and Social Justice

After the launch of the Lab, two of our co-Directors talked about Data Justice and our plans for the Lab at at the Re:publica conference 2017 in Berlin.