'This is NOT human services': Counter-mapping automated decision-making in social services in Australia

This paper offers a counter-map of automation in social services decision-making in Australia. It aims to amplify alternative discourses that are often obscured by power inequalities and disadvantage. Redden (2005) has used counter-mapping to frame an analysis of big data in government in Canada, co...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of sociology (Melbourne, Vic.) Vic.), 2024-09, Vol.60 (3), p.618–642-618–642
Main Author: Sleep, Lyndal
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Artificial intelligence
Automation
Big Data
Data processing
Decision making
Discourses
Econometric models
Efficiency
Evaluation
Finance
Government
Human services
Inequality
Management
Mapping
Moral and ethical aspects
Neoliberalism
Planning
Social service
Social services
Welfare state
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Summary:This paper offers a counter-map of automation in social services decision-making in Australia. It aims to amplify alternative discourses that are often obscured by power inequalities and disadvantage. Redden (2005) has used counter-mapping to frame an analysis of big data in government in Canada, contrasting with 'dominant outward facing government discourses about big data applica- tions' to focus on how data practices are both socially shaped and shaping. This paper reports on a counter-mapping project undertaken in Australia using a mixed methods approach incorporating document analysis, interviews and web scraping to amplify divergent discourses about automated decision-making. It demonstrates that when the focus of analysis moves beyond dominant dis- courses of neoliberal efficiency, cost cutting, accuracy and industriousness, alternative discourses of service users' experiences of automated decision-making as oppressive, harmful, punitive and inhuman(e) can be located.
ISSN:1440-7833
1741-2978
DOI:10.1177/14407833241266022