Systems Analysis as Infrastructural Knowledge

Datos Bibliográficos

ID4297903
AutoresEglė Rindzevičiūtė (0000-0002-1050-4873, Kingston University, autor de correspondencia)
Año2019
Volumen51
NúmeroS1
Páginas204-227
Fecha de publicación2019-12-01
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessNo
TipoARTICLE
RevistaHistory of Political Economy (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 0018-2702 • E-ISSN: 1527-1919
EditorialDuke University Press (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1215/00182702-7903300
OpenAlexW2973787182
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas3
Referencias citadas59

This article explores the political effects of the development of systems analysis as a form of "infrastructural knowledge"-that is, as a form of knowledge concerned with infrastructure, and an infrastructure of knowledge-that contributed to internal dissensus among scientific experts in the Soviet Union. Systems expertise is largely missing from existing work on the history of Soviet infrastructure. The article analyzes the development of governmental, managerial, and industrial applications of systems analysis in the Soviet context, as well as the transfer of Soviet systems expertise to developing countries. It argues that systems analysis constitutes a form of infrastructural knowledge that enabled Soviet scientists to criticize governmental policies, particularly largescale, top-down infrastructure projects. This critique is interpreted as an expression of a new normativity about what constitutes good governance; it became particularly salient when Soviet scientists were facing infrastructural projects in the global South. Systems analysis, in this way, constituted an important intellectual resource for endogenous liberalization of the authoritarian regime

Authoritarianism · Context (archaeology · Corporate governance · Democracy · Economic system · Economics · Liberalization · Management · Political science · Politics · Salient · Sociology · Soviet union · Work (physics · Chinese history and philosophy · Engineering · Law · Water Governance and Infrastructure