Sociotechnical Systems Versus Technological Determinism
Topic 1: Sociotechnical Perspective Versus Tool View
The sociotechnical perspective (Irvine School/Rob Kling) holds that technology and society mutually constitute each other as inseparable phenomena—tech shapes society AND society shapes tech simultaneously and continuously (bi-directional, not one-way).
This rejects the tool view (Introna 2006), which wrongly treats technology as a neutral, objective artifact separate from society where only humans have agency (anthropocentric). Introna argues the tool view hides politics embedded in tech; instead, technology “folds” social relations and we must maintain “reversibility of foldings” to make the ethics/politics of IT visible.
Mutual constitution means tech and society co-evolve: for example, social media was designed based on desires for connection (society→tech) but then reshaped how we socialize and perform identity (tech→society) in continuous cycles. This differs from “impacts” research, which treats tech as an external force affecting society (maintaining tech/society separation).
The sociotechnical perspective asks:
- Not “What are impacts of Amazon?”
- But “How does Amazon embody labor control values and mediate labor value within power structures?”
Winner’s “artifacts have politics” supports this: if design choices are political choices that embed power relations, then tech is not neutral; it’s inseparable from social context. The sociotechnical perspective makes visible political questions the tool view hides: whose interests does tech serve, who benefits, who’s harmed?
Topic 2: Technological Determinism Critique
Technological determinism is the belief that technological innovation occurs outside society and dictates social change unilaterally. Tech develops autonomously according to its own logic, and society just reacts (tech→society, one-way).
The course critiques simple determinism because it misses mutual constitution: society shapes tech (who funds it, who designs it, what problems it addresses) and tech shapes society simultaneously (Introna).
Shared Determinism in Opposing Narratives
The critical insight is that BOTH:
- Techno-utopian narratives (tech→automatic progress, “technology will solve all problems”)
- Cyber-dystopian narratives (tech→automatic doom, “AI will destroy us”)
…share technological determinism despite appearing opposite. Both treat technology as an autonomous force dictating outcomes, whether positive or negative.
Examples:
- Utopian: Bush’s Memex optimism, Barlow’s cyberspace declaration, Andreessen’s “software eating the world.”
- Dystopian: AI apocalypse scenarios where autonomous systems exterminate humanity.
The sociotechnical perspective rejects BOTH extremes: technology doesn’t autonomously cause progress OR doom because tech is designed within social/political contexts and embeds values/power relations from those contexts (Winner: artifacts have politics; Whitaker: plantation origins shaped computing purposes).
Both narratives obscure crucial political questions by treating technology as fate rather than choice. The real questions are:
Key Sociotechnical Questions
- Who designs technology?
- Whose interests does it serve?
- What power relations are embedded?
- How can we shape tech toward different ends?
Topic 3: Techno-Utopian Narratives
Techno-utopian narratives present technology as the primary driver of progress, claiming technological advancement automatically brings positive social change and can solve all material problems. They are optimistic, often naive, and ignore power relations, social context, and who benefits versus who’s harmed.
Characteristics of Techno-Utopianism
- Tech as automatic progress: More tech = better world.
- Solutionism: “There’s an app for that.”
- Liberation narratives: Tech frees us from constraints.
- Inevitability: Tech progress is natural/unstoppable.
Historical Examples:
- Bush’s Memex vision (1945) augmenting human knowledge.
- Wells’ World Encyclopedia (1938) promising universal knowledge access.
- Barlow’s Declaration of Independence of Cyberspace (1996) claiming a government-free utopia.
Turner (2006) shows how 1960s counterculture optimism (hippies, communes) transferred values to 1990s Silicon Valley cyber-utopianism (libertarianism, individualism, “move fast and break things”). This reveals techno-utopianism has specific ideological origins (libertarian, anti-government) rather than being universal or neutral.
Contemporary examples include Andreessen’s “software is eating the world” and Silicon Valley mantras treating disruption as inherently good.
Critiques of Techno-Utopianism
The course challenges techno-utopianism through multiple lenses:
Sociotechnical Lenses
- Winner shows artifacts have politics (not neutral progress).
- Whitaker reveals computing’s origins in plantation control systems (not liberation).
- Gender readings demonstrate tech “progress” systematically excluded women (Light’s erasure, Hicks’ “feature not bug”).
- The sociotechnical perspective reveals we can’t solve social problems with purely technical solutions because technology embeds the very power relations that create those problems.