gianpaolo baiocchi

sociology, broadly conceived

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i am an associate professor of sociology and international studies at Brown University, and concerned citizen-at-large.

  • Interview with Bruno Latour from Figure/Ground

    Original Available here

    © Bruno Latour and Figure/Ground Communication
    Dr. Latour was interviewed by Andrew Iliadis on September 24th, 2013

    Bruno Latour is Professor at Sciences Po. Dr. Latour is a leading figure in sociology, anthropology, and science and technology studies, and he is the author of numerous books, including Laboratory Life, We Have Never Been Modern, and Reassembling the Social. He holds many honorary doctorates and in 2012 he was awarded the Legion of Honour. In 2013, he gave the Gifford Lectures at the University of Edinburgh and in the same year he was awarded the Holberg Prize. His latest research project is an anthropology of the Moderns and includes a book, An Inquiry into Modes of Existence (Harvard), as well as an interactive research website, www.modesofexistence.com

    Your latest book, An Inquiry into Modes of Existence, turns once again to the notion of the modern. I’ve heard you say this book is a positive approach. Can you explain what you mean in terms of positive and negative, and how this is a shift from your previous study?
    (more…)

  • Arendt debating Social Science, Kieran Bonner

    Arendt debating Social Science, Kieran Bonner.

  • Actors and Networks – the excellent zine by Jonathan Tollefson

    Came in as a final project in my ANT class last Spring.

  • Ethnographies from the Future: What can ethnographers learn from science fiction and speculative design?

  • New Issue of Thesis 11 on the Subject of Politics/ New Essay on Rancière

    Thesis 11 was good enough to publish, after quite some time in the pipeline, the essay that Brian Connor and I wrote on Rancière’s politics.  You can find it here under Writings.

  • good luck, sociological science!

    Hear hear!

    fabiorojas's avatarorgtheory.net

    The new journal, Sociological Science, is now up and running. The goal:

    • Open access: Accepted works are freely available, and authors retain copyright
    • Timely: Sociological Science will make editorial decisions within 30 days; accepted works appear online immediately upon receipt of final version
    • Evaluative, not developmental: Rather than focus on identifying potential areas for improvement in a submission, editors focus on judging whether the submission as written makes a rigorous and thoughtful contribution to sociological knowledge
    • Concise: Sociological Science encourages a high ratio of novel ideas and insights to written words
    • A community: The journal’s online presence is intended as a forum for commentary and debate aimed at advancing sociological knowledge and bringing into the open conversations that usually occur behind the scenes between authors and reviewers

    I congratulate them for doing this. This takes some courage to do. We need many different types of journals. And, sadly, we are lacking…

    View original post 36 more words

  • ‘Pardon the Inconvenience, We Are Changing the Country’* | Boston Review

    Boston Review was good enough to publish this short article by Ana Claudia Teixeira and I.  A follow-up comes out next week.

    ‘Pardon the Inconvenience, We Are Changing the Country’* | Boston Review.

    Gianpaolo Baiocchi
    Ana Claudia Teixeira
    June 26, 2013
    (*) Slogan seen on the streets of São Paulo

    On June 13, overzealous military police in São Paulo attempted to end a bus-fare protest with batons and and tear gas. The sweeping arrests and rubber bullets were able to disperse much of the crowd that night, but not before images and testimonials were circulated widely, including of journalists and bystanders being attacked. This had been the fourth and largest demonstration of the Free Fare Movement, which had been agitating since the beginning of the month against a 20-cent rise in bus fares. Outrage quickly turned to Twitter-speed mobilization, and the movement flooded the streets again on June 17, this time with over 100,000 people and with companion protests in other large cities as well. Throughout the country pepper spray was treated with vinegar, police violence with outrage and more mobilization, and by week’s end not only had the bus-fare hike been repealed in both São Paulo and Rio, but millions of Brazilians had joined the movement with a growing list of demands, protesting World Cup projects and calling for long-promised political reforms such as the stalled campaign financing reform proposal. (more…)

  • America’s Infrastructure Report Card

    An Interesting Post from Installing (Social) Order

    Nicholas's avatarInstalling (Social) Order

    The American Society for Civil Engineering has created a nifty interactive website about the state of infrastructure in America at http://www.infrastructurereportcard.org/.

    The website is appealing to look at and intuitive to use if you’re curious about, in this case, how poor American infrastructure really is in the late 2000s and early 2010s. Bottom-line: America gets a failing grade, but only-just-failing at a D+.

    Capture

    For STS scholars, this might be one of those great cases in the rough that could bring the “assessment” or “accounting” literature together with infrastructure studies given that the infrastructures must be defined in order to be counted and compared, and, as such, provides a right backdrop upon with some solid STS-oriented research could start from … and STSers will no doubt love this “grading rubric” available at the sight to legitimize and justify the grading standards. Also, of particular interest to scholars…

    View original post 60 more words

  • The Robots are Here (1)

    I have no idea what actor network is behind this, but I was very pleased when Michael Rodriguez passed along the robot summary video of that classic, 2005, book, Militants and Citizens.  It really is all out of our hands.

  • Participatory Budgeting Hits New York City | Pretty Good Piece in The Nation

    Participatory Budgeting Hits New York City | The Nation.

    Elizabeth Whitman has written a pretty good piece in the Nation about NY’s Participatory Budget.  What’s esp nice about it is that she considers critical perspectives pretty centrally.

    Participatory Budgeting Hits New York City

    April 16, 2012

    A community resource center to help residents find jobs and to give kids a place to hang out. Lighting in public parks to discourage gang activity. Security cameras. Computers and a smartboard for PS 269’s after-school program. These projects, chosen by residents but not yet implemented, have already come a long way since they were first proposed last fall, thanks to months of hands-on research and labor-intensive collaboration by residents of New York City’s 45th district, in Flatbush, Brooklyn. Residents transformed 278 rough ideas for community improvement into thirteen formal project proposals, and at the end of March, they voted for up to five projects they wanted to see funded. Three other New York City districts separately followed the same process.

    (more…)

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