ten - Contemporary governance discourse and digital media: convergences, prospects and problems for the ‘Big Society’ agenda

Summary

Introduction

This chapter looks at how concepts and vocabularies emerging in relation to the internet (online) could usefully be applied to understandings of offline contemporary community life and practices. It is an account of this exploratory enterprise into the linkage between the discursive practices of the internet and contemporary governance. The chapter has four sections.

The first considers the discursive resonances between the internet (as a form of digital media) and contemporary governance as articulated in the ‘Big Society’ agenda of the former Conservative–Liberal Democrat Coalition government (henceforth referred to as ‘the UK Coalition government’). The second considers how such discourses are embodied in digital media practices of ‘hacking’ and ‘read–writing’, which provided the conceptual framework for the development of an innovative public artwork in Wester Hailes, Edinburgh, Scotland.

The third section is an account of the practical application of ‘hacking’ through the design and functionality of the ‘totem pole’ as a public digital artwork. The section explains the context from which digital technology was ‘hacked’ into by local residents to create public art, the research team's role in it and how the created physical digital platform was, in turn, used to ‘hack’ into images and memories that enabled individuals to engage in collective conversations and to share a sense of community.

The fourth section offers insights into how an embedded ‘read–write’ facility in public art presented possibilities for community engagement and regeneration. It also highlights that this form of ‘hacking’ into technology through community-generated public art was possible through co-production. While we acknowledge the varied conceptions of this term, by ‘co-production’, we mean a research approach that emanated from and is informed by the community. It is about working with communities in an empowering way that offers them greater control of the research and opportunities for learning. Such control implies involving communities in all stages of the research process, from design through implementation to the dissemination of research outcomes and outputs (Pohl et al, 2010: 271). Co-production is also about striving to maintain respect and openness in negotiating terms of engagement between researchers and the communities in order to reflect their lived experiences (Robinson and Tansey, 2006: 159).