What can GIS do?

This special issue is organized around the deceptively simple question: "what should the doing of critical GIS look like?" Instead of declaring what path critical GIS should take, I instead argue that we do not know what GIS can do. I suggest that we hold a place for doubt and unknowing, acknowledging that the potentials and possibilities of GIS do not preexist practice, but rather, critical GIS emerges in the doing and practice of GIS. Following this argument, I make three main claims in the article. First, I argue that understanding the possibilities for GIS requires being attentive to how particular instantiations of GIS connect with social and material relations. Second, I argue that the doing of critical GIS might use these existing limitations as a starting point for theremaking of GIS. Third, I argue that the doing of critical GIS has an important role to play in understanding how GIS is used within infrastructures of governance. I conclude by suggesting that the doing of critical GIS takes meaningful form through experimentation, openness to the encounter, and linking with existing situated practices and theories.

GIS and E-Governance for Urban Local Bodies in India

Critical GIS recognizes that GIS technology is socially constructed and emphasizes the key role of socio-political and institutional contexts in shaping GIS use. This chapter focuses on the use of GIS for e-governance by urban local bodies (ULB) in the southern state of India and reflects on the status of the project. In recent years the massive proliferation of ICTs in India has led to a transformation from traditional governance to e – governance. Several planning projects have been launched under the rubric of e-governance. The theoretical framework used in this study draws from the Critical GIS body of literature that calls for taking a holistic approach to GIS examination by coupling the internal contexts with the external contextual environment shaping GIS use. To achieve this goal qualitative methods of inquiry are adopted to investigate a GIS based municipal e-governance project initiated by the Government of Karnataka to address issues of urban development.