Actor-Networks and Taking Responsibility

Abstract

The first question of this study stressed that for dealing with the problem of whether we can take responsibility, it needs to become clear what it actually means to say that technologies play a social role. As clarified in Chap. 2, Actor Network Theory (ANT) teaches three important lessons: first, in exerting social power, the actions of humans and technologies are comparable. Second, the origin of action is dislocal, meaning that not just one human or technology determines the outcome, but that agency is the result of interactions between multiple humans and technologies. Third, the techno-social networks are constantly evolving as the human-technology associations are continuously formed, changed and broken off.