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Brian Klinkenberg
Geography, UBC
Geospatial Technologies:
Hope, Fear andResponsibilities
Geography 570
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How are geospatial technologies and products associated with geographies of hope and fear?
What responsibilities do we have as Geographers?
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The root of all evil?
“Subscribing to a view that technologies such as computers or GIS are "good or evil" in and of themselves seems naïve, but in the early days of quantitative geography, many commentators did just that, and, more recently, GIS has been targeted with such criticism.” (Waters 2004)
GIS
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Good? “Your request caught my eye
for the very reason I had never in my entire forty-five year career thought of the application of geospatial technologies in the context of fear. It has always from my perspective been applied because of hope, although I must concede that fear of losing something is a motivator as well. … the message to me has always been hope.”
(email from Jule A. Caylor, USDA Forest Service, Remote Sensing Applications Center, March 2005)
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Evil?
“Topographical data are routinely fed to any number of global databases using much touted geographical information systems (GIS) that facilitate resource extraction, surveillance, and rule and, if necessary, attack across geographic scale by various social actors. People in power seem to have gone map-crazy, which at times seems no more than a form of “gun-crazy” once removed.” (Katz 2001 page 1215)
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Hope and fear
A simultaneous display of hope and fear.
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A sea change
9/11/01—no one doubts that the age of surveillance has begun.
“The very idea of surveillance evokes curiosity, desire, aggression, guilt, and, above all, fear…” (Tabor, 2001, 135).
We need to re-examine everything in this new age of the Panopticon.
Produced by the New York Surveillance Camera Players
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The quicksands of time Sean Gorman's professor called his dissertation "tedious
and unimportant." … But since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, Gorman's work has become so compelling that companies want to seize it, government officials want to suppress it, and al Qaeda operatives -- if they could get their hands on it -- would find a terrorist treasure map. (Blumenfeld Dissertation Could Be Security Threat Washington Post July 8,
2003; Page A01) “Consequently, nothing per se is a risk and, conversely,
everything may become one if the appropriated techniques are historically invented and deployed” (Vaz and Bruno 2003 page 283).
http://www.cs.washington.edu/research/networking/rocketfuel/interactive/
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Crossing the line?
The line separating power from care is becoming nebulous. (Vaz and Bruno 2003 page 273)
A company called Teen Arrive Alive provides a service—Speed Alert—that can inform the parents if a cell phone is observed traveling faster than a certain speed. Another service—Geo Fencing—can be associated with a geographic perimeter so that if the phone leaves that area an alert is sent to the parents. (http://www.teenarrivealive.com/)
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The ever-surveillant society (GPS, video cameras and facial recognition systems, GIS, RFIDs, etc.) will enshrine our daily activities forever—mistakes become permanent. Will we create a blackmail society? (Gray 2003 page 324).
“Parents may not like it when it comes out in litigation that their child really was driving 270 kilometers an hour.” (Harris 2004)
Unintended consequences
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Contradictions in the age of the Panopticon “While surveillance may aim to support informal control
it tends to drive responsibility away from individuals, creating a feeling that there is no longer need to watch over each other” (Koskela 2003 page 294).
We see a breakdown of social responsibility, a lessening of social cohesion, while at the same time the Panopticon is seen as engendering “habituated anticipatory conformity” (Vaz and Bruno 2003 p 275).
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“But…we do not know the beginning of the story, how the fearing was developed—how the unsafe came to be associated with place, how the cartography of real and potential danger, which informs consciouschoices of daily access and movement, was formed” (Epstein 1997 page 134).
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A loss of place: geodemographics “Trends in geodemographics are moving from this view
of the world as consisting of fixed places—at any scale—within which live people of like lifestyles. Rather, the systems increasingly embody—and promote—a different way of thinking about the behavior of individuals and households.” (Page 10)
“So, just as a focus on region devolved into a focus on the individual inhabitant, now the focus on the individual has been replaced by an interest in the space of the individual.” (Phillips and Curry nd page 25).
“the “where” of “you are where you live,” is now thought of as the skin that marks the boundaries of your physical extension.”
(Phillips and Curry nd page 16)
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A sense of place: health geography
“Although the overall standard of living had increased, the geography of poverty at the end of the 19th century was very similar to that at the end of the 20th century. Moreover, the geography of all causes of death for people over the age of 65 was more strongly related to the geography of poverty in the late 19th century than contemporary patterns of poverty” (Orforda et al. 2002 page 25).
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The tyranny of genetics
“Until now, a person became ‘sick’ only after symptoms appeared. People would go to the doctor complaining of a few aches and pain. With availability of the data on the genome, future illnesses or risk of illnesses will be revealed…. People will become patients before their time.” (Jacob, 1998, p. 102)
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The tyranny of space? “Life now depends on knowing how to behave in the distance
between everything that may happen and what is more probable of happening; it depends on the restriction of possibilities—and not upon their invention and posterior realization” (Vaz and Bruno 2003 page 287).
Will you be denied medical coverage because of the spacesyou occupied throughout your life?
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Take a stance
Be pro-active in your use of geospatial technologies. “The loss of equal voting rights caused by
gerrymandering—taken to new depths of precision through [GIS]—has disenfranchised the vast majority of Americans….” (Gruenstein 2004)
React—use students to create alternative realities, as Mark Rush of Washington and Lee University does. Use gerrymandering as an example application during GIS Day, showing alternative realities that reflect the spirit in which GIS was developed.
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Use your expertise
West Nile Virus in BC
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Geospatial Technologies and Human Rights Project.
Geospatial technologies broaden the ability of international organizations, government agencies, and non-governmental organizations to rapidly gather,
analyze, and disseminate authoritative information, especially during times of crisis. They can also provide compelling, visual proof to corroborate on-the-ground
reporting of conflicts and natural disasters affecting human rights.
http://shr.aaas.org/geotech/
Madoua, Chad.
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Human Rights Watch
Madoua, Chad.
March 2006 November 2006
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Monitoring Climate Change
http://www.imagingnotes.com/go/
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Fear and hope? I firmly stand alongside of those that see
that the benefits of geospatial technologies far outweigh the costs.
Geospatial technologies can provide hope in many different areas, from identifying potential health concerns—both for people and the environment—to humanitarian efforts—removing land mines and helping alleviate poverty—to fighting crime, to legitimately helping fight terrorism.
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None-the-less, we need to be vigilant in monitoring how these technologies are being used, and sometimes we may need to become activist in order to ensure that future generations don’t live under the tyranny of geography, but rather benefit from the spatially-informed analyses that geospatial technologies enable us to perform.
Speak out, Participate, Demonstrate
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References
Gruenstein, P. 2004. Quoted in “Carving out your Vote” written by Ralph Nader and published in In the Public Interest. 8/13/04
Harris, M. 2004. Keeping tab on teens, by cellphone. The Ottawa Citizen, Ont.: Sep 22, 2004, pg. A.3.
Jacob, F. 1998. Of flies, mice, and men. Cambridge, Ma.: Cambridge University Press.
Waters, N. 2004. GIS and Martus: Technology with a Conscience. GeoWorld. http://www.geoplace.com/gw/2004/0403/0403edge.asp
