[ecrea] cfp The Social Productivity of Anonymity

Call for papers for an ephemera special issue on:
The social productivity of anonymity


Issue Editors: Götz Bachmann and Andreas Wittel

Anonymity is deeply tied to the European values of liberty, equality and 
fraternity. Concealing one’s identity can enable freedom (as in the 
anonymity of speech), support equality (e.g. in anonymous application 
procedures), and provide the basis for non-reciprocal relationships as 
expressed in the value of brotherhood (e.g. asking a stranger for 
directions). It is capable of traversing cultural differences and is 
essential for many contemporary forms of sharing, communality and 
collaboration (e.g. commons based peer production such as Wikipedia 
entries and open-source software). However, it is also contested and, 
indeed, under threat: networked databases, biometric identification and 
surveillance technologies such as CCTV are matched by discourses that 
condemn anonymity and celebrate transparency and openness. Legal, 
technological and moral imperatives towards transparency contribute to a 
process in which anonymity is increasingly under attack. As a 
consequence, the ‘end of anonymity’ has been declared in public 
discourses, not only since the revelations of Edward Snowden. However, 
this claim deserves to be scrutinised a bit further.

Using a more analytical perspective, it becomes apparent that anonymity 
constitutes a specific form of social relation in which potentially 
identifying markers of individuality and difference are dissociated from 
specific individuals and collectives. This has the effect of creating 
situational, relational and partial forms of unknowability, 
invisibility, and untrackability (Nissenbaum, 1999; Ponesse, 2013). As 
contemporary societies are increasingly based on networked 
infrastructures we face new questions of how information, property and 
people can be disconnected. This holds true with regard to phenomena 
such as the international activist network Anonymous, internet-based 
communication, and forms of ‘algorithmic anonymity’ (Rossiter and Zehle, 
2014). The social, moral, and legal significance of anonymity is also 
reflected in such controversial domains as baby drop-off boxes and 
anonymous births, the anonymous donation of organs, gametes, and blood, 
as well as peer reviewing and application procedures.

Research into current transformations of anonymity at the intersections 
of technologies/infrastructures and politics is surprisingly thin. 
Empirical scholarship is fragmented and theoretical conceptualizations 
are rare (Nissenbaum, 1999; Frois, 2009; Wiedemann, 2012; Ponesse, 
2013). With a perspective on everyday social and cultural practices 
future research will be able to build on a number of ethnographies such 
as Konrad’s work on egg donation (2005), Copeman’s comparative inquiries 
into blood donation (2009), Frois’ exploration of anonymity in self-help 
groups (2009), Lock’s ethnography of organ transplantation (2002), and 
Coleman’s study of hackers who operate under the Anonymous label (2010, 
2013). While these studies provide some methodological and theoretical 
groundwork, none of them has addressed anonymity in its full complexity, 
nor have they linked constellations of anonymity regimes across 
different case studies.

To collect insights into the ways in which anonymity is modified, 
maintained or abandoned in contemporary online-offline worlds, this 
special issue will combine three areas of research into anonymity: (1) 
research into technologies and infrastructures of information, 
communication, surveillance and identification; (2) research into the 
regulation, ethics and politics of anonymity; and (3) research into the 
everyday practices of anonymity ranging from sperm donation to social 
media, from peer review to police work, from political mobilisation to 
self-help groups.

While anonymity is a deeply ambivalent social form we are particularly 
interested in contributions that defend anonymous interactions. Can we 
develop a concept of anonymity that emphasises its cultural and 
political values and its social productivity? Can we demonstrate that 
anonymity enhances, enriches and strengthens the social?

We welcome contributions from a wide range of disciplines, looking for

    *

      Enquiries into the technical dimensions of anonymity: What forms 
of standards, protocols, software designs, technologies and aesthetics 
are shaping anonymity? How are they designed, decided upon, regulated 
and changed?
    *

      Ethnographic case studies into local formations of anonymity, 
especially those that connect online-based forms of anonymity with 
offline practices.
    *

      Case studies on the macro and micro-politics of anonymity, 
especially when anonymity becomes problematic. What undermines anonymity 
in specific settings, who develops strategies in its defence and to what 
aim?
    *

      Research into activist tactics and strategies for enabling 
anonymity, and attempts to raise the public socio-technical literacy 
with regard to managing identifying information (for example cryptoparties).
    *

      Research into the legal, moral or ethical principles and 
(historical) discourses, and how they are enacted, reflected, criticized 
or recreated by heterogeneous actors while doing/undoing anonymity.
    *

      Theoretical and empirical articles on the properties of 
anonymity, such as blockages of tracing identification, continuities 
between past and present and the prevention of reciprocity, and 
anonymity’s duration, (non-)reversibility and dynamics.
    *

      Theoretical and empirical articles on ways in which anonymity 
connects to concepts and practices of the person, the self, the social, 
of private/public constellations, of statehood, property and the commons.

Contributions

Potential contributors are asked to write an extended abstract (between 
500 and 1000 words). Abstracts should be sent to both editors 
(goetz.bachmann [at] leuphana.de and andreas.wittel [at] gmail.com). The 
deadline for the submission of abstracts is 15 January 2015. 
Notification of acceptance of abstracts will be 1 March 2015, and the 
deadline for the submission of full papers is 30 September 2015. Please 
note that three categories of contributions are invited for the special 
issue: articles, notes, and reviews. All submissions should follow 
ephemera’s submissions guidelines (www.ephemerajournal.org/how-submit). 
Articles will undergo a double blind review process.
References

Bauman, Z. (2011) ‘Is this the end of anonymity? From microdrones to the 
internet, technology is invading the private sphere – with our 
encouragement’, The Guardian, 28 June.

Coleman, E. G. (2010) ‘What it’s like to participate in Anonymous 
actions’, The Atlantic, December.

Coleman, E. G. (2013) ‘Anonymous and the politics of leaking’, in B. 
Brevini et.al. (eds.) Beyond WikiLeaks: Implications for the future of 
communications, journalism & society. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.

Copeman, J. (2009) ‘Introduction: Blood donation, bioeconomy, culture’, 
Body & Society, 15 (2): 1-28.

Frois, C. (2009) The anonymous society: Identity, transformation and 
anonymity in 12 steps. Cambridge: Cambridge Scholars Publishing.

Fuchs, C. (2009) Social networking sites and the surveillance society. A 
critical case study of the usage of studiVZ, Facebook, and MySpace by 
students in Salzburg in the context of electronic surveillance. Salzburg 
/ Vienna: Research Group UTI.

Hirschauer, S. (2004) ‘Peer-Review-Verfahren auf dem Prüfstand. Zum 
Soziologiedefizit der Wissenschaftsevaluation’, Zeitschrift für 
Soziologie, 33 (1): 62-83.

Kerr, I., V. M. Steeves and C. Lucock (eds.) (2009) Lessons from the 
identity trail. Anonymity, pseudonymity, and identity in a networked 
society. Oxford / New York City: Oxford University Press.

Konrad, M. (2005) Nameless relations. Anonymity, melanesia, and 
reproductive gift exchange between British ova donors and recipients. 
New York: Berghahn.

Levin, T. Y., and P. Weibel (eds.) (2002) CTRL [SPACE]: Rhetorics of 
surveillance from Bentham to Big Brother. Cambridge: MIT Press.

Lock, M. (2001) Twice dead. Organ transplants and the reinvention of 
death. Oakland: University of California Press.

Marx, G. T. (1999) ‘What’s in a name? Some reflections on the sociology 
of anonymity’, The Information Society, 15 (2): 99-112.

Nissenbaum, H. (1999) ‘The meaning of anonymity in an information age’, 
The Information Society, 15(2) 141-144.

Ponesse, J. (2013) ‘Navigating the unknown: Towards a positive 
conception of anonymity’, The Southern Journal of Philosophy, 51 (3): 
320-344.

Rossiter, N. and S. Zehle (2014) ‘Toward a politics of anonymity: 
Algorithmic actors in the constitution of collective agency and the 
implications for global economic justice movements’, in M. Parker, G. 
Cheney, V. Fournier & C. Land (eds.) Routledge companion to alternative 
organization. London: Routledge.

Wiedemann, C. (2012) ‘Irrepresentable collectivity. Anonymous and the 
technologies of the common’, in G. Cox and C. U. Andersen (eds.) World 
of the news. Aarhus: Digital Aesthetics Research Centre, Aarhus University.

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