Inequality, Innovation and Change
This programme area is focused on understanding how processes of innovation and change shape inequality and how alternative pathways of change might be imagined, explored, and supported.
While much inequality research understandably concentrates on outcomes (such as income, wealth, or access), this programme focuses on processes: how economic, technological, spatial, and institutional change unfold under unequal conditions, and why dominant change pathways so often reproduce or intensify inequality despite reform efforts.
The programme responds to a growing recognition, particularly in African and Global South contexts, that addressing inequality requires not only redistribution or regulation but also rethinking the underlying logics of innovation, development, and socio-economic organisation. It creates an intellectual and practical experimental space within SCIS to explore these questions rigorously without displacing or duplicating the centre's existing strengths.
Research in the programme is organised around six thematic areas:
- Digital Platforms and Markets
- Digital Labour and Employment
- Social Media and Digital Communication
- Data Privacy and Ethics
- Digital Inequality and Access
- Sociotechnical Systems and Human-Technology Interaction