Science and technology studies

Science and technology studies (STS) or science, technology, and society is an interdisciplinary field that examines the creation, development, and consequences of science and technology in their historical, cultural, and social contexts. History Like most interdisciplinary fields of study, STS emerged from the confluence of a variety of disciplines and disciplinary subfields, all of which had developed an interest—typically, during the 1960s or 1970s—in viewing science and technology as socially embedded enterprises. The key disciplinary components of STS took shape independently, beginning in the 1960s, and developed in isolation from each other well into the 1980s, although Ludwik Fleck's (1935) monograph Genesis and Development of a Scientific Fact anticipated many of STS's key themes. In the 1970s Elting E. Morison founded the STS program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), which served as a model. By 2011, 111 STS research centers and academic program

Opacité et transparence dans le design d'un dispositif de surveillance urbain : le cas de l'IMSI catcher

Félicien Michel Marie Goguey

This thesis assesses the surveillance operated on the mobile phone network by governmental actors (intelligence agencies, police, army) and the relationship between monitored spaces and their users. Indeed, some new surveillance devices used by intelligence services redefine surveillance spatiality raising new questions in this field of research. More specifically this research focuses on one specific object: the IMSI catcher, a monitoring apparatus of the cellular network that intercepts cellphones' identity and some communications in a given area by mimicking the activity of a cell tower. While this kind of device seems to offer a tactical and a security interest in the fight against terrorism and against crime, many civil liberties organisations such as the Electronic Frontier Foundation, Privacy International and _La Commission nationale de l'informatique et des libertÃ©s are concerned about the potential of an uncontrolled surveillance ; indeed, the controversial nature of the device could endanger certain individual and public rights. What is this technical object and which new issues comes with its use in surveillance? How and from which perspective is it problematic What does the IMSI catcher teaches us on the potential future of surveillance regimes? I look into this specific device case in a research framework at the intersection of design research practices, science and technology studies (STS) and surveillance studies. First, I deal with this surveillance apparatus as a technical object, from a perspective fed by the theoretical framework of concretization and technical lines proposed by Gilbert Simondon and Yves Deforge, through the analysis of a visual and technical documentation. Second, I use a research by design approach to explore certain assumptions regarding the nature of the object itself, its functioning and its "concrete" aspect â or rather "non-concrete" in the present case â with the help of approaches borrowed to reverse engineering and reconstitution, close to media archeology. Then, I explore possible opposition and protest trajectories with the help of prototypes designed with critical design and speculative design methods. Finally, through the writing of prospective scenarios, I build a design fiction that offers a synthesis, potentially subject to debate, around the IMSI catcher's uses, present and to come, and more broadly on the potential future of surveillance regimes.

EPFL2022

The influence of industry downturns on the propensity of product versus process innovation

Christopher Tucci, Cristiano Zazzara

This article sheds light on how industry fluctuations affect firms' propensity to innovate. We test two seemingly conflicting arguments that suggest how firms are more or less inclined to engage in innovation activities during industry fluctuations. By studying a panel of 622 Italian manufacturing firms during the period 1995-2003, we show how differentiating between product and process innovation may help reconcile the theory of opportunity cost of innovation with the cash-flow effect argument. We find that industry downturns are related to product and process innovation in different ways: firms tend to invest in product innovation rather than process innovation in downturns. The findings have implications for both theory (showing when the opportunity cost of innovation dominates) and research design (showing the importance of both the input and output measures in innovation studies and how they might influence the results).

Oxford University Press2014

Opacité et transparence dans le design d'un dispositif de surveillance urbain : le cas de l'IMSI catcher

Félicien Michel Marie Goguey

EPFL2022

Science and technology studies

Opacité et transparence dans le design d'un dispositif de surveillance urbain : le cas de l'IMSI catcher

The influence of industry downturns on the propensity of product versus process innovation

Science and Technology Studies at EPFL

Opacité et transparence dans le design d'un dispositif de surveillance urbain : le cas de l'IMSI catcher

The influence of industry downturns on the propensity of product versus process innovation

Science and Technology Studies at EPFL