edgelands blog

Read about Hannah Mackaness’ experience working in advertising technology to collaborating with the Edgelands Institute. The author highlights the need for public education on the complexities of surveillance, data collection, and targeting in the digital age.

In March 2023, a Social Laboratory was established in Cúcuta. The meetings aimed to assess Cúcuta's current security situation, address challenges, and explore the potential impact of digital security solutions while working towards a practical proposal for the city.

Last month we asked some residents and visitors of the city about their feelings on the topics of security and surveillance in the form of a 'Vox Pop', or short interviews, that we filmed in the streets of Geneva. In the following post, we will reflect on the answers we received.

Participant in Edgelands' Fellowship program, Sophia Sennett explores in this blog post the relations between climate change, climate intelligence and social contract.

Last month at the International Museum of the Red Cross in Geneva, the first two photographers involved in this adventure came to present their work. This discussion allowed us to discover two very different approaches but also to evoke the specificity of the medium of photography in research.

The beginning of the research sprint in Cúcuta

The piece deals with the analysis of a choreography based on the embodied reactions people have to the idea of increased digital surveillance in their cities.

As part of Edgelands x Magnum project, Angel Tames de Sousa researched the rights to access information of the CCTV recordings in public spaces in Geneva. This blog post exaplaines his process: the obstacles, findings, and his perspective on the subject.

Cynthia Chepkemoi, Edgelands’ Research Associate, describes her visit to Konza Technopolis, Kenya’s first smart city, and explores the meanings of “smart city” in Kenyan technological and urban contexts of development.

At Edgelands we harness the power of creative forms artists employ to ask hard questions, foster dialogues, materialize the voices and lives of those affected by political decisions. In this blog post, Andres Boada and Santiago Uribe comment on the artistic outcomes of MATZA Edgelands Cúcuta.

In partnership with OPPi, from June 22 to November 15 of 2022, we invited the residents of Geneva to participate in the online participatory survey “What Are the Dangers That Threaten Your Safety in Geneva?”.

I asked a trending AI chatbot to come up with a text that would summarize the issures explored by the Edgelands Institute in terms of digitalization of security and its impact on living together in an urbanized world.

In his work-in-process art book, Emre Altindag explores the anxiety of being constantly watched as a consequence of digitalisation of security in contemporary society.

Klea Bogdani tells about her participation in the Research Sprint "We are Recording You Geneva".

How should the Swiss Confederation safeguard its values, interests, and you, its residents, in a digital space that is increasingly turning into an economic and geopolitical battleground? This blog post argues that the answer to this question should not be left solely to elected politicians or public officials but rather be the result of an inclusive societal dialogue surrounding the sovereignty of Switzerland in the digital age. To do so, the blog post examines the Swiss Federal Council’s decision to store the federal administration's data on foreign tech companies’ servers, highlights its national security and privacy implications, and draws parallels with the national debate on railroad nationalization in the 19th century.

An Edgelands Institute/Urban AI Research Project

The Forum Border, Security and Surveillance Technologies: Challenges and Opportunities for Cúcuta” brought together city officials, researchers, Venezuelan professors, members of the Metropolitan Police, students and representatives of civil society organizations to discuss the main security challenges affecting the city

In this blog post, Maria Camila Roldán synthesizes the learnings from different Edgelands' activities in the city of Medellín, including: interviews, research marathon, art residencies, data marathon and a workshop with Editores de Ciudad.

The “social lab” is Mi Sangre Foundation’s methodology for creating an ecosystem of transformation that relies on collaboration and capacity as modes of interrogation.

Edgelands had the chance to speak to a dozen female migrants in Geneva to hear their thoughts on the findings of our diagnostic report.

Edgelands had the opportunity to engage with the senior community in Geneva to understand how the advent of digital technologies has impacted the social fabric of the city.

We sat down with Sara Arango Franco, team member and one of the primary facilitators and designers of our new data analysis workshops to talk about the motivations behind the program and how it’s gone so far.

While the algorithms running in AI programs are efficient in processing thousands of variables and computing millions of data, they are also opaque by nature in their operation.

International Geneva, as we call the cluster of foreign delegations and international organizations massed on the beautiful shores of Lake Geneva, hides a dark side.

App-based food-delivery drivers, working for Uber Eats, Deliveroo, and other online labor platforms, are nowadays a highly visible part of cities all around the world. However, their overt observability stands in stark contrast to the opaque "algorithmic" management practices and precarious working conditions they are subjected to. This blog post sets out to shed light on local responses to secure app-based delivery workers' employment and data rights in Geneva, Switzerland.

We humans have a tendency, even a need, to share about our lives, from the most shocking events to the everyday.

Urban art often aims to make the artifacts tell a story, inspire dialogue and interpretation and send a message of resistance that is also visible in urban space.

On technology as a tool in safety infrastructure.

The program, launched in partnership with Universidad EAFIT, convenes 50 "sprinters" and topic experts once a week in conversation about the digitalization of urban security in Medellín.

"How are digital surveillance technologies changing the social contracts in urban settings and what can people and cities do about it?". This was the question posed by Yves Daccord, Executive Chairman and Co-Founder, at the Edgelands Institute official soft launch on April 9th and second launch hosted in Central Asian Time on April 26th.

Using online social networks to identify suspects and potential criminals is part of a push within law enforcement towards big data surveillance and predictive policing analytics. However, critics warn that the use of predictive policing can enhance racial discrimination in the criminal justice system.

"I was personally taken with Zuckerman’s theoretical insights concerning soft power and his discussion of the failures of national institutions (...)", says Cat Keegan about Mistrust by Ethan Zuckerman.

Mateus Guzzo, Research Associate of Edgelands Institute, explores the interaction between surveillance technology and entrepreneurialism.

What place does surveillance technology have in the classroom?

What are pop-ups? A powerful tool for redefining urban areas, pop-ups can be a useful tool for reshaping the social contract, but how and where they are deployed can have significant consequences.

As digital technology increases in urban contexts, a new concept of “smart city” is born. In this blog post, Adriana Lasso-Harrier explores the meanings of this contemporary urban experience and its consequences on governance.

We were joined by visionaries and tech-experts Elizabeth Adams and Bruce Schneier to dive into issues relating to digital surveillance. 

Edgelands sat with Enrique Peñalosa, -the two-times Mayor of Bogota, Colombia - for a digital conversation. An authority in Urban affairs, Mr. Penalosa experienced first-hand some of the most pressing issues faced by cities. Most of his professional career has been devoted to thinking about public transport systems, mobility, and public spaces in cities. During his time in office, Mr. Penalosa led the 10+ million inhabitants of the Colombian Capital through some of its greatest challenges. In this conversation with the Edgelands team he reflected on some of the most urgent urban and political issues: the legitimacy of authority and how to make Cities drivers of equality.

Yves Daccord, Chief Executive Officer, shares his thoughts about the importance of building a new social contract.

On April 30th 2021, the Edgelands Institute held its first Café Croissant conversation with Yves Daccord, Yvette Sánchez, Séverin Guelpa and Sarah Newman.

What lessons can we learn from COVID-19 to be inclusive in our design of a new urban social contract? Who are the voices we are leaving out that need to be heard?

This blog post reviews four theories and frameworks that offer some guidelines to balance interests such as efficient governance, justice, fairness, individual liberties, and public safety.

The Edgelands Institute sat down with the architect and urban designer Christina Leigh Geros to talk about how deep soils and arid soils create an attending set of political, social, and ecological relations.

A close look to the Norwegian social contract model.

The Edgelands Institute had a chance to sit down for a conversation with Hans Vestberg, CEO of Verizon Communications, to hear his perspective on what businesses and private corporations can do to uphold their obligations to society.

The social contract, broadly conceived, is a pact among individual members of a society with the goal of advancing collective interests. Cities play a crucial role in the formation of community by nurturing the public sphere and healthy encounters of difference.