Paper short abstract:

With a global history approach, I analyze the construction of different sociotechnical worlds against diarrheal diseases in the South and the North. I argue that domination in the laboratory affected the design of infrastructural technologies for the North and small-scale fixes for the South.

Paper long abstract:

While diarrheal diseases have always been a truly global affliction, different sociotechnical worlds have been constructed to keep them at bay. Infrastructure technologies – such as water and sanitation infrastructure – have significantly reduced mortality rates in the North. In contrast, small-scale technologies such as oral rehydration salts have been designed for the South, where diarrheal diseases continue to be the main cause of childhood death. This project explores how political conditions in laboratories of technology design underlie such technological bifurcation. I build on subaltern studies’ conceptualization of domination without and with hegemony as a key characteristic of metropolitan and peripheral rule. Going back to the late 19th century, four historical case studies explore how far such political differences co-produced the construction of infrastructural and small-scale technologies. Infrastructural technologies such as water filtration or hospital-based intravenous rehydration therapy have depended on support from domination with hegemony to extend far-reaching, at the same time promising to support the hegemonic stance of medical and public health establishments. In contrast, small-scale interventions such as oral rehydration salts or disinfection techniques of colonial empires were developed in contexts of domination without hegemony, promising to demand neither the legitimized backing of affected populations nor extended financial support. The project charts novel theoretical ground for STS scholarship in exploring how domination in the laboratory interacts with technology design; exploring the interplay of global political and technological inequities.