As data-driven technologies continue to transform welfare services, concerns over their misuse—particularly through surveillance—have grown. Former UN Special Rapporteur on Extreme Poverty and Human Rights Philip Alston (Alston, 2018) warned that digital welfare services might lead to intrusive surveillance, where welfare recipients are unfairly scrutinized and penalized. Automated decision-making and predictive analytics are increasingly used to manage services, often under the guise of neutrality. However, these systems can reinforce power imbalances, disproportionately affecting marginalized and economically disadvantaged groups (Birhane, 2021, Taylor, 2017).
The JUSST project (2024–2026), funded by the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions and hosted by OsloMet, aims to investigate how data-driven technologies are used in welfare services, comparing two types of digitally monitored welfare recipients in Norway and the Netherlands: (1) individuals who receive income support due to unemployment or short-term sickness leave and (2) offenders under electronic monitoring (EM). This comparison is relevant because it provides insights into data-driven technologies in two institutions at the nexus of care and coercion (Miller & Stuart, 2017), both emphasizing labour market (re)integration, albeit to different degrees. Furthermore, the comparison allows us to theorise about the mechanisms through which surveillance becomes experienced as punitive, by comparing different manifestations thereof: while surveillance of income support recipients is often latent and ambiguous, it is explicitly punitive for offenders.
JUSST aims to build a theoretical framework that describes and explains current uses of data-driven technologies and the ways in which they relate to sociotechnical imaginaries (Jasanoff, 2015), focusing on issues such as morality, justice, and redistribution. Furthermore, the project aims to develop a normative framework that ensures data-driven technologies serve to empower communities rather than deepen their marginalization. JUSST therefore adheres to the principles of collaborative action research, where research participants serve as co-researchers, ensuring that the voices of those most affected are central throughout the research process and in the frameworks developed. This participatory approach emphasizes that marginalized communities must not just be subjects of study but active contributors to the creation of just systems.
In line with scholarly work in this field (Boenig-Liptsin, 2022; Birhane et al., 2022), we start from the position that striving for justice within surveillance systems requires more than technical fixes. It demands a shift in how we approach digital welfare, emphasizing ethical practices that centre the experiences of the people most affected. The JUSST project is a critical exploration of how surveillance technologies shape welfare systems and marginalized populations, and how we can make them better. By centring the voices of those most impacted, the project contributes to a future where data-driven technologies foster empowerment and social justice.
Bibliography
Alston, P. (2018). Report of the Special rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights, A/74/48037.
Boenig-Liptsin, M. (2022). Aiming at the good life in the datafied world: A co-productionist framework of ethics. Big Data & Society, 9(2), 20539517221139782
Birhane, A. (2021). Algorithmic injustice: a relational ethics approach. Patterns, 2(2).
Birhane, A., Isaac, W., Prabhakaran, V., Diaz, M., Elish, M. C., Gabriel, I., & Mohamed, S. (2022, October). Power to the people? Opportunities and challenges for participatory AI. In Proceedings of the 2nd ACM Conference on Equity and Access in Algorithms, Mechanisms, and Optimization (pp. 1-8).
Jasanoff S (2015) Future imperfect: Science, technology, and the imaginations of modernity. In: Jasanoff S and Kim S-H (eds) Dreamscapes of Modernity: Sociotechnical Imaginaries and the Fabrication of Power. Chicago: Chicago University Press, pp.1–33
Miller, R. J., & Stuart, F. (2017). Carceral citizenship: Race, rights and responsibility in the age of mass supervision. Theoretical Criminology, 21(4), 532-548
Taylor, L. (2017). What is data justice? The case for connecting digital rights and freedoms globally. Big Data & Society, 4(2), 2053951717736335)
About the author
Marijke Roosen is a MSCA postdoctoral researcher at OsloMet, where she is part of the Research Centre for Digitalization of Public Services and Citizenship (CEDIC), contributing to critical discussions and research on how technology impacts society. Her work explores how surveillance systems and data-driven technologies shape contemporary social structures, with a particular focus on feminist perspectives and ethical considerations. Professor Rune Halvorsen and Professor Marit Haldar are the supervisors of the JUSST project. They both work at CEDIC, OsloMet.
Personal page: Marijke Roosen – OsloMet