[SIGCIS-Members] Call for Ideas!

Wed Aug 24 13:57:53 PDT 2016

Paul in the area of disasters htere is a host of interactions of
infrastructures.
new zealand after every disaster requires an analysis of how the critical
infrastructures behaved in how they interfered with one another.
critical infrastructures includes things like modes of transportation and
whether certain things that are needed can reach those that need it.
in he paper i mentioned near the start the  16 major infrastructures could
all possibly interact with one another and that is why we needed 20 or so
experts to determine which ones did interact with what other ones, clearly
some do not interact but it also depends on what country you are talking
about since there are things like all hospitals in europe must have 8 days
of drinking water stored.   and also in most places in the u.s. if the
electricity goes out than gas stations cannot pump gas so that leads to
very significant interaction problems.   the paper shows examples where the
experts disagreed with one another and their arguments about disagreements
was a 40 page document not published with the paper.  the model we evolved
focused on the u.s. because that is where the majority of the experts in
the delphi were from.
i showed the details of two disagreements in the published paper.
by the way in NJ for example, the only gas stations required to have
electronic
generators to be able to pump gas are on the new jersey turnpike.   most
citizens have no idea of the complications between infrastructures.  local
governments dont make these things clear.

On Wed, Aug 24, 2016 at 3:49 PM, Paul N. Edwards <pne at umich.edu> wrote:

> So there are two variants of “critical infrastructure studies” now —
> “[critical infrastructure] studies” and “critical [infrastructure
> studies]”. I think Lori’s usage (the second one) is new, and still rare. It
> also may not be possible to distinguish STS-y versions of “infrastructure
> studies” from “critical infrastructure studies” (Lori’s sense).
>
> To my knowledge, the first use of the phrase “critical infrastructure” was
> around 1997-98, by the Clinton-era President’s Commission on Critical
> Infrastructure Protection (PCCIP). Perhaps there were earlier uses of the
> phrase that I don’t know about.
>
> The PCCIP focused in part on vulnerabilities created by connections across
> infrastructures - cyber with electric and phone, for example. People
> working in one, e.g. cyber, tended to ignore vulnerabilities due to their
> interaction, e.g. cutting major undersea cables (physical attack, not
> cyber) would also take out chunks of the Internet.
>
> The PCCIP work became input to the new Dept of Homeland Security after
> 9/11/2001.
>
> There’s a 100-plus page report, issued around 1999. If it’s too hard to
> find email me and I will send you a copy.
>
> Best,
>
> Paul
>
>
>
> On Aug 23, 2016, at 22:06 , Lori Emerson <lori.emerson at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Thanks all for the responses.
>
> I just remembered that I came across "critical infrastructure studies" in
> this excerpt from Alan Liu's book-in-progress tentatively titled "Against
> the Cultural Singularity: Digital Humanities & Critical Infrastructure
> Studies." http://liu.english.ucsb.edu/drafts-for-against-the-
> cultural-singularity/
>
> He writes something to the effect that he's borrowing a "lightly
> anti-foundationalism" from critical infrastructure studies but I'm not sure
> yet who he's engaging with in terms of the latter and was curious about
> whether critical infrastructure studies had become an established branch
> from the main field or whether it's not well known or considered
> idiosyncratic.
>
> In terms of "critical," Liu quotes from Michael Agre's writings on
> artificial intelligence research: “The word ‘critical’ here does not call
> for pessimism and destruction but rather for an expanded understanding of
> the conditions and goals of technical work. . . .  Instead of seeking
> foundations it would embrace the impossibility of foundations, guiding
> itself by a continually unfolding awareness of its own workings as a
> historically specific practice.”
>
> yours, Lori
>
> On Tue, Aug 23, 2016 at 4:27 PM, Alberts, Gerard <G.Alberts at uva.nl> wrote:
>
>> Eh, but Tom, aren't getting off on a tangent here?
>> I agree with Brian that "critical" in this context is an adjective to
>> infrastructures, not to the study of it -even if we do not have to exclude
>> to possibility of a critical theory of infrastructures.
>> Infrastructures were deemed critical by those who observed that the
>> breakdown of such infrastructures would bring the whole of society to a
>> standstill. I would think, the high voltage power networks were the key
>> example. Whether the expression "critical infrastructure"  was brought into
>> the debate by military strategists, political scientists, anthropologists
>> or by those building the networks, I do not know. Interesting historical
>> question. Of equal interest is when and by whom IT-infrastructures were
>> considered so crucially important, that they were called "critical".
>> Gerard
>> ------------------------------
>> *Van:* Members [members-bounces at lists.sigcis.org] namens Thomas Haigh [
>> thomas.haigh at gmail.com]
>> *Verzonden:* dinsdag 23 augustus 2016 23:42
>> *Aan:* 'Lori Emerson'
>> *CC:* members at lists.sigcis.org
>> *Onderwerp:* Re: [SIGCIS-Members] Call for Ideas!
>>
>> I don’t think critical adds a whole lot to “infrastructure studies.” It
>> has some usefulness in formulations like “critical management studies” (a
>> thing in Northern Europe but no so much in the US) as management
>> scholarship is usually uncritical in every sense of the word. So “critical”
>> demarcates a scholarly community deliberately taking a unorthodox
>> approaches to challenge the assumptions of the field.
>> http://www.criticalmanagement.org/content/about-cms
>>
>>
>> But science studies, STS, media studies, etc. manage to embrace a variety
>> of socially and culturally informed perspectives without their
>> practitioners needing to add the “critical” in front of them. Adding
>> “critical” might be seen as a challenge to those currently embracing
>> “infrastructure studies” as a scholarly identity. There’s also the question
>> of whether “critical” means critical as in “critical thinking” or as in
>> “critical theory,” and while critical theory certainly has a place among
>> other approaches in the study of infrastructure not everyone would feel
>> comfortable with the suggestion that it should be elevated over approaches
>> grounded in STS, history, sociology, anthropology, etc.
>>
>>
>> Best wishes,
>>
>>
>> Tom
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> *From:* Members [mailto:members-bounces at lists.sigcis.org] *On Behalf Of *Lori
>> Emerson
>> *Sent:* Tuesday, August 23, 2016 1:39 PM
>> *To:* Paul N. Edwards <pne at umich.edu>
>> *Cc:* Dag Spicer <dspicer at computerhistory.org>; members at lists.sigcis.org
>> *Subject:* Re: [SIGCIS-Members] Call for Ideas!
>>
>>
>> Dear all, I just wanted to thank you for sending in these great resources
>> for infrastructure studies - I came across the term "critical
>> infrastructure studies" a couple months ago and got quite excited about how
>> it seemed more expansive and more useful for describing my projects on labs
>> and the pre-history of the internet than either "media archaeology" or just
>> "media studies." But now I wonder what the extra "critical" denotes since
>> there's a somewhat well established field already of I.S.? Any thoughts?
>>
>>
>> yours, Lori
>>
>>
>> On Tue, Aug 23, 2016 at 11:43 AM, Paul N. Edwards <pne at umich.edu> wrote:
>>
>> Dag, here’s a partial list. I’ll be curious to hear what others might add.
>>
>>
>> Bowker & Star, *Sorting Things Out: Classification and Its Consequences*
>>
>>
>> Simon & Marvin, *Splintering Urbanism — *kind of a giant lit review,
>> mostly focused on urban physical infrastructure but with some attention to
>> digital
>>
>>
>> Edwards, A Vast Machine: Computer Models, Climate Data, and the Politics
>> of Global Warming <http://pne.people.si.umich.edu/vastmachine/index.html>
>>
>>
>> Edwards et al., Understanding Infrastructure: Dynamics, Tensions, and
>> Design <http://pne.people.si.umich.edu/PDF/ui.pdf> (NSF report with some
>> lit review)
>>
>>
>> Starosielski, *The Undersea Network*
>>
>>
>> Check the books in my *Infrastructures* book series
>> <https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/series/infrastructures>, co-edited with
>> Geof Bowker - e.g. Larry Busch, *Standards: Recipes for Reality*
>>
>>
>> Also this very recent paper
>> <https://www.academia.edu/27555302/Infrastructure_studies_meet_platform_studies_in_the_age_of_Google_and_Facebook> on
>> platforms vs. infrastructures - not sure it counts as “canonical”!
>>
>>
>> Best,
>>
>>
>> Paul
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> On Aug 22, 2016, at 16:20 , Dag Spicer <dspicer at computerhistory.org>
>> wrote:
>>
>>
>> Can anyone suggest some canonical and effective texts in Infrastructure
>> Studies?
>>
>> Thanks!
>>
>> Dag
>> --
>> Dag Spicer
>> Senior Curator
>> Computer History Museum
>> Editorial Board, IEEE Annals of the History of Computing
>> 1401 North Shoreline Boulevard
>> Mountain View, CA 94043-1311
>>
>> Tel: +1 650 810 1035
>> Fax: +1 650 810 1055
>>
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>>
>> —————————————————
>>
>> Paul N. Edwards, Professor of Information <http://www.si.umich.edu/> and
>> History <http://www.lsa.umich.edu/history/>
>>
>> Distinguished Faculty in Sustainability, Graham Sustainability Institute
>> <http://graham.umich.edu/>
>>
>> Senior Fellow, Michigan Society of Fellows
>> <http://societyoffellows.umich.edu/>
>>
>>
>> Terse replies are deliberate <http://five.sentenc.es/>. Here's why!
>> <http://emailcharter.org/>
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>>
>> University of Michigan School of Information <http://www.si.umich.edu/>
>>
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>> Twitter: @AVastMachine <https://twitter.com/avastmachine>
>>
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>> _______________________________________________
>> This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org, the email discussion
>> list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member
>> posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list
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>>
>>
>>
>> --
>>
>> Lori Emerson
>> Associate Professor | Director, Media Archaeology Lab
>> Department of English and Intermedia Arts, Writing, and Performance
>>
>> University of Colorado at Boulder
>> Hellems 101, 226 UCB, Boulder, CO 80309-0226
>> loriemerson.net | mediaarchaeologylab.com
>>
>
>
>
> --
> Lori Emerson
> Associate Professor | Director, Media Archaeology Lab
> Department of English and Intermedia Arts, Writing, and Performance
> University of Colorado at Boulder
> Hellems 101, 226 UCB, Boulder, CO 80309-0226
> loriemerson.net | mediaarchaeologylab.com
> _______________________________________________
> This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org, the email discussion
> list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member
> posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list
> archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and
> you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/
> listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org
>
>
>
> —————————————————
> Paul N. Edwards, Professor of Information <http://www.si.umich.edu> and
> History <http://www.lsa.umich.edu/history/>
> Distinguished Faculty in Sustainability, Graham Sustainability Institute
> <http://graham.umich.edu>
> Senior Fellow, Michigan Society of Fellows
> <http://societyoffellows.umich.edu>
>
> Terse replies are deliberate <http://five.sentenc.es/>. Here's why!
> <http://emailcharter.org>
>
> University of Michigan School of Information <http://www.si.umich.edu/>
> 4437 North Quad
> 105 S. State Street
> Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1285
> Twitter: @AVastMachine <https://twitter.com/avastmachine>
> Web: pne.people.si.umich.edu
>
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> _______________________________________________
> This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org, the email discussion
> list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member
> posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list
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