How is international humanitarianism taking on new imperatives, protagonists, investments, techniques and objects of inquiry in connection with the expanding reach of the digital? In the fourth edition of our QUT Global Law, Science and Technology Seminar Series, Professor Fleur Johns (UNSW Faculty of Law) discussed how international human practice and thinking are being transformed by digital technology and associated socio-technical practices. This seminar is now available to watch online.
Professor Johns explored one part of a book project emerging from socio-legal inquiry along these lines, ongoing for several years. This inquiry has focused on the work, collaborators and interlocutors of Pulse Lab Jakarta (part of the UN Global Pulse initiative). The discussion focussed on one shift that appears to be nascent within this sphere – a shift with potentially very significant social, political and legal ramifications.
The presentation can be viewed online at The QUTube, the official YouTube channel for Queensland University of Technology (QUT).
Guest presenter
Fleur Johns is Professor in the Faculty of Law at UNSW Sydney working in international law and legal theory. Commencing in 2021, she is also an Australian Research Council Future Fellow and, in 2020-2021, a Visiting Professor at the University of Gothenburg, Sweden. Her current research focuses on changing modes of lawful relation and practice emerging in the context of technological change. She is presently leading a 3-year Australian Research Council-funded project entitled ‘Data Science in Humanitarianism: Confronting Novel Law and Policy Challenges’ (with co-CI Wayne Wobcke, UNSW Computer Science). In 2019-20, Fleur pursued this research as a member of the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, in the School of Social Sciences. Fleur has previously held visiting appointments in Europe, the UK and Canada and currently serves on editorial boards in the US, the UK and Australia, including that of the American Journal of International Law.
About the series
The QUT Global Law, Science and Technology Seminar Series aims to bring together national and international speakers who will explore the personal, societal and governance dimensions of solving real world problems which are influenced by, and through the interactions of science, technology and the law.
The series will host speakers who think about ‘technology’ and ‘science’ as broadly construed to refer to methods of framing or interacting with the world, and that enable the critical and imaginative questioning of the technical, science, environmental and health dimensions of law and life.
