Under the Calculative Gaze

Sanela Jahić’s project investigates how socially-applied technological tools are not only directly intertwined with unresolved injustices of our current system, but actually accelerate a transition towards authoritarianism that is present in the technology industry itself, in the politics of various countries and institutions, and in the rise of far-right political movements.

The artist examines the political resonances of AI as it offers greater social efficiency through acts of separation and segregation. The targets of the extensive digital control and algorithmic optimization are typically “low-rights environments,” where expectations of political responsibility and transparency are low. These sites are used for the introduction of process automation and predictive analytics, amplifying vulnerabilities stemming from long-standing social policies, increasing neoliberal inequalities, and accelerating different dimensions of necropolitics.

To counteract this, collective practices of self-organization are presented, where positions of social and political disadvantage give rise to solidarity across differences and beyond models of algorithmic governance.