Examining science communication on Reddit: From an “Assembled” to a “Disassembling” approach

This study examines science communication within Ask Me Anything sessions hosted by US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration scientists on Reddit. In addition to considering a unique social media platform, our work makes an important contribution in revealing the limitations of a traditional approach to studying science communication and modeling an alternative. First, using an “assembled” approach, we qualitatively explore themes in National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration scientists’ posts and consider how they reflect the goals of “deficit” and “dialogue” models. Second, using a “disassembling” approach, inspired by Davies and Horst and actor-network theory, we more deeply examine our experiences studying the Ask Me Anything sessions. We then demonstrate how this alternative approach identifies “hidden” human and non-human actants that may have shaped science communication as “mediators.” We use these insights to reject the common assumption that science communication on social media occurs solely and directly between scientists and publics.

Postmodern Philosophy as a Condition for the Emergence of Posthumanism Theory

The article presents a brief retrospective of the conceptions of philosophical postmodernism in their connection with posthumanism. Posthumanism is a philosophical movement that has been actively developed in the last decade, with its roots in the 60s and 70s of continental philosophy. The discourse of posthumanism implies work and development of conceptions and notions used by M. Foucault, J. Derrida, J. Deleuze and F. Guattari, R. Barthes and others. Connecting with such philosophical trends as disability studies, animal studies, postcolonial philosophy, actor-network theory, intersectional feminism, posthumanism expands, complements and reincarnates many provisions of postmodern philosophy. This article outlines the main concepts used in posthumanist discourse.

Resilience of Social-Infrastructural Systems: Functional Interdependencies Analysis

Critical infrastructures serve human activities and play an essential role in societies. Infrastructural systems are not isolated but are interdependent with regard to social systems, including those of public health and economic and sustainable development. In recent years, both social and infrastructural systems have frequently been in dysfunction due to increasing natural or human-made disasters and due to the internal and external dependencies between system components. The interconnectedness between social-infrastructural systems (socio-economic systems and technical-infrastructural systems), implies that the damage to one single system can extend beyond its scope. For that reason, cascading dysfunction can occur and increase system vulnerability. This article aims to study the functional interdependencies between social-infrastructural systems and to propose a methodology to analyse and improve the resilience of these systems. Combining Actor Network Theory and the Functional Models approach, the social-infrastructural Interdependence Resilience (SIIR) framework was proposed. To assess the applicability of the approach, the framework was applied to study the interdependence of a social-infrastructural system in the Nantes Metropolis. The studied system was composed of the local Highway Infrastructure (an infrastructural system) and the Emergency Medical Service (a social system). The results (1) show the feasibility of SIIR for investigating the interdependencies of two urban systems, and (2) provide a guideline for decision-makers to improve the functional interdependencies of urban systems.

Design for poverty alleviation and craft revitalization in rural China from an actor-network perspective: the case of bamboo-weaving in Shengzhou

Design for poverty alleviation (DPA) is becoming an active promoter and effective practice form of rural social innovation. This study aims to explore the sustainable, collaborative design path of rural poverty alleviation. Based on actor network theory, this study analyzes the poverty alleviation process of rural actor network construction and participatory translation through the perspective of design integration. The case study chooses the traditional Chinese handicraft, Shengzhou bamboo weaving, to discuss the key links and elements of sustainability such as the role, benefits, and interaction of multiple actors. The staged effectiveness and social impact of the design integration are evaluated by questionnaire surveys, in-depth interviews, qualitative and quantitative data collections, a logistic regression model was used to test for significant effects while adjusting for multiple factors simultaneously. The analysis shows that although DPA is difficult to realize the fundamental adjustment of the rights and interests of rural craftsmen, it plays a key role in guiding the development of industrial goals, expected economic and social benefits, brings huge driving force and implementation effect to rural social innovation. The actor network theory solves the problem of separation between the individual and network attributes of DPA among stakeholders, and provides an innovative basis for rural social innovation to choose effective design intervention and mechanisms to balance the rights and interests of various stakeholders.

Flattening Relations in the Sharing Economy

The sharing economy (SE) includes economic, social, and technological arrangements to promote collaborative relations between users and providers willing to share assets through digital platforms (DP). Even evolving fast, there is an opportunity to discuss how DP establishes connections between users and providers and uses a digital agency to mediate and flatten consumption relations in SE. Therefore, the authors propose a framework and future research directions that explore characteristics of the actants (roles, agency, behavioral attitudes) in the process of flattening consumption relations through DP in SE (connections, mediation, induction). To structure this framework, the authors consolidated the various definitions of its main elements and adopted the actor-network theory concept of translation as the theoretical-methodological approach to analyze the associations that determined how flattening consumption relations occur in SE.

ANT Perspective of Healthcare Big Data for Service Delivery in South Africa

In South Africa, there has been for many years challenges in how healthcare big data are accessed, used, and managed by facilities, particularly the small health facilities. The challenges arise from inaccuracy and inconsistency of patients' data and have impact on diagnoses, medications, and treatments, which consequently contributes to fatalities in South Africa, particularly in the rural areas of the country. The problem of inaccuracy and inconsistency of patients' data is often caused by lack of or poor analysis (or analytics) of data. Thus, the objective of this research was to understand the factors that influence the use and management of patients' big data for healthcare service delivery. The qualitative methods were applied, and a South African healthcare facility was used as a case in the study. Actor network theory (ANT) was employed as a lens to guide the analysis of the qualitative data. Based on the findings from the analysis, a model was developed, which is intended to guide analytics of big data for healthcare purposes, towards improving service delivery in the country.

The implementation of activity-based costing by a local government: an actor-network theory and trial of strength perspective

Purpose Some public sector organizations have decided to implement activity-based costing (ABC), a new cost calculation device and management accounting innovation initially designed for the private sector. The purpose of this study is to better understand the translation of this new calculation device in the context of a local government and to identify the trials of strength that actors faced during the implementation. Design/methodology/approach Building on actor-network theory and the concept of “trial of strength,” this study examines how a major change in a large local government’s structure, the merger of several cities, led to the adoption of ABC. This case study provides a setting for conducting a longitudinal analysis of the translation of a cost management innovation, ABC, in a public sector organization. Findings This study highlights how human and non-human actors interact when implementing a management accounting innovation in a local government and the trials of strength that they face. It also shows that although ABC helped the local government deal with issues such as setting fees, assessing outsourcing opportunities, increasing accountability and improving processes, the oversophistication of the technology used to implement the ABC model and the lack of links between the costing device and the budgeting process provoked a struggle among these two networks, leading actors to choose the budget over ABC. Originality/value This study’s findings extend the work on trials of strength of Christensen et al. (2019) and Laguecir et al. (2020). While those two studies focused on the struggles existing between opposing networks of human actors regarding the strategic orientation or the mission of public sector organizations, this study highlights that trials of strength may also occur when actors agree on the objectives of the new accounting innovation but not on how it is implemented.