Or proof against social determinism?
As the media has widely reported, the use of the Web in the recent Egyptian protests was hugely important. I do not want to delve too deeply into the specifics of the protests in this post; instead the point I want to make (my own opinion of course) is that the way these tools were grasped upon by the citizens shows that the technological determinism argument in sociology is far superior to that of social determinism. I am not a sociologist, and do not claim to understand fully the arguments within this discipline – however these two hypotheses are important with regards to Web Science and understanding how the Web is shaping society (or is society shaping the Web?).
Technological determinism states that technological changes are expected, and that new technologies determine how a society develops to use that new technology. On the other hand, social determinism regards technology to be a product of a society and that new technologies are created only when society has suitably demanded them. (Based on Wikipedia)
My view with regards to the Egypt situation is that the Web tools used to enhance the protests (Facebook, Twitter and Youtube as examples) were created long before these protests began. Society then developed to embrace these facilities, to use them in a way unforeseen by their creators, and to help to influence the real world. This surely shows that technological determinism is (more) correct (or at least believable), and leaves me wondering where the social deterministic argument for this case is.
So what does everyone think? Who agrees with the technological argument, and who sides with social determinism - and why? Have I missed anything glaringly obvious in the Egypt example which disproves my whole argument?
OTOH, twitter is a great example of social determinism! Hashtags, follow friday and even retweets are emergent behaviour that was not planned - Retweets are now incorporated into the software, an example of society shaping the technology. And surely the Egyptian government switching off the internet is an example of society (or part thereof) having an impact on technology? Perhaps this is more apparent in China, where the societal events in one country resulted in new technological restrictions being put in place by the Chinese government.
ReplyDeleteThe point is that neither of the perspectives stands on it's own - In reality, technology and society drive one another.
I definitely agree that in general they do seem to drive each other. This is partly why I don't really understand sociological theories - they all just seems to be made up of two extremes that in reality are unlikely, so everything just ends up being somewhere in the middle, and not part of a theory at all. Maybe any sociologists who read this can clarify this for me?
ReplyDeleteHowever, taking a slightly more technological deterministic view for the purpose of this post - I think it can be argued that for all the instances when society shapes technology, the technology itself has already been created and in some way shaped society. For example Retweets only shaped the technology because the technology had already been implemented and provided society the chance to post short messages to the World via the Web.
I think that while the perspectives complement each other, it does (to me, anyway) seem that the social shaping of technology can only occur once technology has somehow shaped society.
you miss the obvious matter of the politicians involved in it.
ReplyDeletehttp://sergeproulx.uqam.ca/social-media-as-tools-of-resistance-disseminating-the-voice-of-the-multitude/