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Ansar A, Khaled AFM. In search of a Rohingya digital diaspora: virtual togetherness, collective identities and political mobilisation. HUMANITIES & SOCIAL SCIENCES COMMUNICATIONS 2023; 10:61. [PMID: 36818039 PMCID: PMC9930011 DOI: 10.1057/s41599-023-01553-w] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/30/2021] [Accepted: 01/31/2023] [Indexed: 06/18/2023]
Abstract
Frequently called the most persecuted minority in the world, the Rohingyas have suffered systematic violence and oppression in Myanmar since the 1970s. Today, the vast majority of the nearly three million Rohingyas are in exile, escaping state-sponsored human rights violations and persecution in the Rakhine state of Myanmar-a place they call "home". Neighbouring Bangladesh, which currently hosts over a million displaced Rohingya, has been a 'sanctuary' for at least the last four decades. A sizable community has also emerged successively in other South-East Asian countries and pockets of Australia, Europe and North America. In this context, bringing together issues at the crossroads of (im)mobilities, online connectivity and the quest for identity, this study examines the role of social media platforms in forming and shaping new types of diaspora activism among the exiled Rohingyas. Drawing on yearlong online ethnographic findings, it unpacks how digital platforms constitute a space for togetherness, where diasporic Rohingya identities are constructed, contested and mediated. Analysing recurring themes and patterns of engagement on these web-based platforms, the paper looks at how diasporic civic and political e-activisms are transforming the very contours of Rohingya identity formation and their pursuit of recognition. Finally, focusing on such a creative constellation of socio-cultural and political issues in virtual space, we demonstrate how Rohingyas practice a politics of resistance and recognition when confronting the policy pretensions of Myanmar's government.
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Affiliation(s)
- Anas Ansar
- Bonn Center for Dependency and Slavery Studies (BCDSS), University of Bonn, Bonn, Germany
| | - Abu Faisal Md. Khaled
- Department of International Relations, Bangladesh University of Professionals (BUP), Dhaka, Bangladesh
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Ye J. Ordering Diversity: Co-Producing the Pandemic and the Migrant in Singapore during COVID-19. ANTIPODE 2021; 53:1895-1920. [PMID: 34188316 PMCID: PMC8222935 DOI: 10.1111/anti.12740] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/22/2020] [Revised: 04/22/2021] [Accepted: 04/22/2021] [Indexed: 06/13/2023]
Abstract
What do measures of management during this exceptional and volatile time tell us about the regulation of migrant-driven diversity and its implications in the arrival city? Using the term "differential diversification" from Singapore, I examine how the socio-political life of the pandemic is deeply entangled with the management of low-waged labour migrants. Techno-political discourses and practices of pandemic management accelerated the state's attempts to differently include migrant workers, revealing the bare viscerality of biopolitics already in place prior to the pandemic. I argue that diversity is ordered through a striking co-production of migrant management and pandemic management. This paper draws upon government discourses to demonstrate that measures of pandemic management contribute not only to the spatial regime of migrant management. They also articulate and rationalise the subject transformation of the low-waged migrant to the extent that, on top of being a moral risk, they are also now a medical risk.
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Affiliation(s)
- Junjia Ye
- School of Social SciencesNanyang Technological UniversitySingapore
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Franklinos LHV, Parrish R, Burns R, Caflisch A, Mallick B, Rahman T, Routsis V, López AS, Tatem AJ, Trigwell R. Key opportunities and challenges for the use of big data in migration research and policy. UCL OPEN ENVIRONMENT 2021; 3:e027. [PMID: 37228797 PMCID: PMC10171412 DOI: 10.14324/111.444/ucloe.000027] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/18/2020] [Accepted: 09/23/2021] [Indexed: 05/27/2023]
Abstract
Migration is one of the defining issues of the 21st century. Better data is required to improve understanding about how and why people are moving, target interventions and support evidence-based migration policy. Big data, defined as large, complex data from diverse sources, is regularly proposed as a solution to help address current gaps in knowledge. The authors participated in a workshop held in London, UK, in July 2019, that brought together experts from the United Nations (UN), humanitarian non-governmental organisations (NGOs), policy and academia to develop a better understanding of how big data could be used for migration research and policy. We identified six key areas regarding the application of big data in migration research and policy: accessing and utilising data; integrating data sources and knowledge; understanding environmental drivers of migration; improving healthcare access for migrant populations; ethical and security concerns around the use of big data; and addressing political narratives. We advocate the need for careful consideration of the challenges faced by the use of big data, as well as increased cross-disciplinary collaborations to advance the use of big data in migration research whilst safeguarding vulnerable migrant communities.
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Affiliation(s)
- Lydia H. V. Franklinos
- Institute for Global Health, University College London, London, UK
- Centre for Biodiversity and Environment Research, Department of Genetics, Evolution and Environment, University College London, London, UK
| | - Rebecca Parrish
- Institute for Global Health, University College London, London, UK
- Institute of Environment, Health and Societies, Brunel University, London, UK
| | - Rachel Burns
- Centre of Public Health Data Science, Institute of Health Informatics, University College London, London, UK
| | - Andrea Caflisch
- United Nations’ Displacement Tracking Matrix, International Organization for Migration, International Organization for Migration, Juba, South Sudan
| | - Bishawjit Mallick
- CU Population Center, Institute of Behavioral Science, University of Colorado Boulder Campus, Boulder, CO, USA
- Faculty of Environmental Sciences, Technische Universität Dresden, Dresden, Germany
| | - Taifur Rahman
- Health Management BD Foundation, Sector 6, Uttara, Dhaka, Bangladesh
- Adjunct Faculty, Department of Public Health, North South University, Dhaka, Bangladesh
| | - Vasileios Routsis
- Department of Information Studies, University College London, London, UK
| | - Ana Sebastián López
- GMV Innovating Solutions Ltd, HQ Building, Thomson Avenue, Harwell Campus, Didcot, UK
| | - Andrew J. Tatem
- WorldPop, School of Geography and Environmental Science, University of Southampton, Southampton, UK
| | - Robert Trigwell
- United Nations’ Displacement Tracking Matrix, International Organization for Migration, United Nations, London, UK
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Taylor L. Public Actors Without Public Values: Legitimacy, Domination and the Regulation of the Technology Sector. PHILOSOPHY & TECHNOLOGY 2021; 34:897-922. [PMID: 33495724 PMCID: PMC7816553 DOI: 10.1007/s13347-020-00441-4] [Citation(s) in RCA: 12] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/01/2020] [Accepted: 11/30/2020] [Indexed: 11/27/2022]
Abstract
The scale and asymmetry of commercial technology firms’ power over people through data, combined with the increasing involvement of the private sector in public governance, means that increasingly, people do not have the ability to opt out of engaging with technology firms. At the same time, those firms are increasingly intervening on the population level in ways that have implications for social and political life. This creates the potential for power relations of domination, and demands that we decide what constitutes the legitimacy to act on the public. Business ethics and private law are not designed to answer these questions, which are primarily political. If people have lost the right to disengage with commercial technologies, we may need to hold the companies that offer them to the same standards to which we hold the public sector. This paper first defines the problem and demonstrates that it is significant and widespread, and then argues for the development of an overarching normative framework for what constitutes non-domination with regard to digital technologies. Such a framework must involve a nuanced idea of political power and accountability that can respond not only to the legality of corporate behaviour, but to its legitimacy.
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Balazka D, Rodighiero D. Big Data and the Little Big Bang: An Epistemological (R)evolution. Front Big Data 2020; 3:31. [PMID: 33693404 PMCID: PMC7931920 DOI: 10.3389/fdata.2020.00031] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/25/2019] [Accepted: 08/07/2020] [Indexed: 01/30/2023] Open
Abstract
Starting from an analysis of frequently employed definitions of big data, it will be argued that, to overcome the intrinsic weaknesses of big data, it is more appropriate to define the object in relational terms. The excessive emphasis on volume and technological aspects of big data, derived from their current definitions, combined with neglected epistemological issues gave birth to an objectivistic rhetoric surrounding big data as implicitly neutral, omni-comprehensive, and theory-free. This rhetoric contradicts the empirical reality that embraces big data: (1) data collection is not neutral nor objective; (2) exhaustivity is a mathematical limit; and (3) interpretation and knowledge production remain both theoretically informed and subjective. Addressing these issues, big data will be interpreted as a methodological revolution carried over by evolutionary processes in technology and epistemology. By distinguishing between forms of nominal and actual access, we claim that big data promoted a new digital divide changing stakeholders, gatekeepers, and the basic rules of knowledge discovery by radically shaping the power dynamics involved in the processes of production and analysis of data.
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Affiliation(s)
- Dominik Balazka
- Center for Information and Communication Technology (FBK-ICT) and Center for Religious Studies (FBK-ISR), Fondazione Bruno Kessler, Trento, Italy
| | - Dario Rodighiero
- Comparative Media Studies/Writing, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, United States.,Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, United States
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Qureshi S. Why Data Matters for Development? Exploring Data Justice, Micro-Entrepreneurship, Mobile Money and Financial Inclusion. INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY FOR DEVELOPMENT 2020. [DOI: 10.1080/02681102.2020.1736820] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 05/08/2023]
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