Posted: August 24th, 2022

Artifacts and Politics

Artifacts and Politics
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Institution

Artifacts and Politics
Artifacts have politics. They establish a certain social infrastructure in the “soft” technical determinism. In this sense, at least a part of technology is innately political. Several technologies are innately democratic, while others are authoritarian. This means that despite their invention or the purpose behind the deployment, they have particular social consequences that can be described in political terms (Matthewman, 2011). Also, histories of architecture, public works, and city planning have numerous examples of physical arrangements that have implicit or explicit political intentions.
Artifacts have political features and can embody forms of authority and subordination. Some inventions are intentionally designed to enforce particular social relations. A good example is the extremely long overpasses along the parkways of New York. Robert Moses intentionally designed them, an architect, as a way of discouraging buses from going underneath them-this acted to prevent individuals in the low-income bracket from easily entering the acclaimed public park since at the time, these individuals used to commute largely by bus (Berman, 2013). They also reflected inequality in society and, in particular, social class bias and racial prejudice. How? During those days, people of color and other minorities also used to commute by bus a lot. As aforementioned, some artifacts are authoritarian, and the atom bomb is one of them; as such, the people who control it have power-this is because they can influence governments/institutions to bend to their will since failure to do so can result in casualties should the people in control decide to use the bombs against them. It is also evident that technologies can be utilized to enhance the authority, power, and privilege of some over others. An example is the utilization of television to sell a candidate.

References
Berman, M. (2013). An excerpt from NEW YORK: A DOCUMENTARY FILM by RIC BURNS. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V9b5UrF8O-s#action=share
Matthewman, S. (2011). Technology and social theory. Macmillan International Higher Education.

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