This paper explores the use of digital archives in advocating for accountability after a 2016 Formosa Plastics toxic disaster in coastal Vietnam, foregrounding how data ideologies shape both advocacy work, and the archives designed to document and support this work.
Long abstract:
In the aftermath of a 2016 Formosa Plastics toxics disaster in coastal Vietnam (which ruined miles of coastline), advocates for victims are striving to hold both the Taiwan-based Formosa Plastics conglomerate and the Vietnamese state accountable. This advocacy is supported by a global coalition of advocates in communities where Formosa Plastic operates. One tactic involves the use of digital archives to construct a body of evidence demonstrating Formosa’s environmental and health harms in many different settings. In this talk, I will reflect on the double binds and design challenges I've encountered while developing these archives on the Disaster-STS Network, an instance of the Platform for Experimental Collaborative Ethnography (PECE). I argue that a key strength of this form of lively archiving is in its production of better understanding of how data ideologies and infrastructures shape advocacy work, in turn shaping the kind of open archives that need to be designed for the future.