Transparency and Surveillance As Sociotechnical Accountability : A House of Mirrors

Surveillance and transparency are both significant and increasingly pervasive activities in neoliberal societies. Surveillance is taken up as a means to achieving security and efficiency; transparency is seen as a mechanism for ensuring compliance or promoting informed consumerism and informed citizenship. Indeed, transparency is often seen as the antidote to the threats and fears of surveillance. This book adopts a novel approach in examining surveillance practices and transparency practices together as parallel systems of accountability. It presents the house of mirrors as a new framework for understanding surveillance and transparency practices instrumented with information technology. The volume centers around five case studies: Campaign Finance Disclosure, Secure Flight, American Red Cross, Google, and Facebook. A series of themed chapters draw on the material and provide cross-case analysis. The volume ends with a chapter on policy implications.

Deborah G. Johnson is Anne Shirley Carter Olsson Professor of Applied Ethics in the Department of Science, Technology, and Society at University of Virginia.

Priscilla M. Regan is Professor in the Department of Public & International Affairs at George Mason University.