Thread by @t_streinz

How to confront data inequality? My @GuariniGlobal @nyulaw colleague @AngelinaFisherD and I are excited to make our background paper for the @WorldBank's #WDR2021 available via @SSRN: papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cf…

The #WDR2021 "data for better lives" is available here: wdr2021.worldbank.org and from @WBPubs here: openknowledge.worldbank.org/handle/10986/3… If the goal is to harness the power of data for development to ensure no-one is left behind, we ought to confront data inequality.

By data inequality we mean not just that data is unevenly distributed (asymmetric control over data - the original sin of the data-driven economy as @DanCiuriak put it) but also the inequality of power to decide what does (and what does not) become data: the power to datafy.

We argue that data inequality is a function of unequal control over the infrastructures that generate, shape, process, store, transfer and use data. We ask about the role of law in data inequality and what interventions might be helpful in mitigating it.

We question the "data as a resource" framing and the metaphors that come with it. We draw on research from science and technology studies, media, communications, and critical data studies to show that data must also be understood as a social construct.

We reference @kanarinka & @laurenfklein's pathbreaking work on data feminism and scholars like @katecrawford @zephoria @RobKitchin @safiyanoble @AVastMachine and others who have drawn attention to inequalities of data production.

Our thinking in this part and in the paper overall is also influenced by @couldrynick & Ulises Mejias's "the costs of connection" which critiques continuities of capitalist colonialism in data extractivism: sup.org/books/title/?i… (con

Our conception of data inequality is narrower than other important work on inequalities in the digital domain. Yet, we hope we are adding something to this broader discourse by integrating insights from infrastructure studies.

Understanding data generation in infrastructural terms draws attention towards the technical, social, organizational dimensions of data infrastructures and their embeddedness in political-economic contexts that are often (but not exclusively) shaped through law.

We focus on corporate control over large scale data infrastructures not to vilify these actors but to acknowledge the outsized importance they have acquired in increasingly digitally mediated economies and societies across the globe.

In the second part we scrutinize legal dimensions of data inequality. We argue that extant law tends to overlook the infrastructural dimensions of data inequality and might even entrench it. Our analysis is inspired by related work by @julie17usc @KatharinaPistor & @akapczynski.

We traverse legal fields that have come to dominate the regulatory discourse in the digital domain. That's why we focus on data protection and privacy law, intellectual property law, antitrust and competition law, and certain aspects of telecommunications law.

We integrate international economic law into our analysis, which is increasingly shaping states' regulatory systems in "megaregulatory" ways: papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cf…

We ask: how does the law facilitate (uneven) data "flows"? We point to infrastructural inequalities (drawing on work by @mediamorphis @roxanav41) and illustrate corporate power over where and how data flows that conventional #NetNeutrality misses.

We ask: who owns data and does it matter? We show how infrastructural control over data operates even if there is no recognized IP right in data. But once control over data is being challenged (eg mandatory data access), legal data ownership may become relevant as a shield.

We ask: how do data protection and privacy guard against data inequality? We are not dismissing the importance of these legal domains in general. But we are skeptical that extant approaches to data protection and privacy are effective in confronting data inequality.

We ask: might antitrust or competition law help to reduce concentrated control over data infrastructures? We believe these these legal domains are more attuned to infrastructural dynamics, yet they remain confined in other ways. There is no silver bullet against data inequality.

On the basis of this analysis, we venture to suggest in the third part of the paper five interventions that might help in mitigating data inequality going forward.

1) We argue that digital development requires room for flexibility and experimentation. For this reason, countries might be prudent to avoid constraints under international economic law that might entrench infrastructural control over data.

2) We suggest that reclaiming infrastructural control over data should be on the table. This might involve the creation of new or alternative data infrastructures. It might also mean to regulate data infrastructures more effectively in the public interest.

3) We argue that more systemic transparency (as opposed to individual access to data rights or data breach notifications) about global data generation is required to enable democratic discourse around digital economy regulation. The existing opacity is a political choice.

4) We suggest that differentiated data sharing infrastructures (which can come in very different forms) can help to govern access to data more evenly. In contrast, "open data" initiatives are unlikely to remedy data inequality and might even contribute to it.

5) Building on @salome_viljoen_'s pathbreaking work on democratic data governance and a forthcoming paper by @nahuelmaisley & Benedict Kingsbury on the publics and publicness of infrastructures, we call for more collective data governance (locally and transnationally).

We are very grateful to @ILI_NYU's interdisciplinary #PRG for initial feedback and to @Elibietti @nikenberger @nielstenoever @PrzemekPalka @Dimitri_VdM @cpjvanveen @annayamaokaetc for commenting on earlier drafts of the paper.

The paper draws on @GuariniGlobal ideas about Global Data Law: guariniglobal.org/global-data-law This research agenda is influenced by thinking about law & global governance that @nyuiilj has pioneered in the #GAL project and carried forward in the @megareg_iilj and #InfraReg projects.