Paradoxical Infrastructures

Ruins, Retrofit, and Risk

Bibliographic Data

ID5336978
AuthorsC Howe (0000-0002-9361-3812, Rice University, corresponding author), Jessica Lockrem (Rice University), Hannah Appel (0000-0001-7896-3227, Department of Anthropology, University of California, Los Angeles), E J Hackett (0000-0002-7935-4498, Brandeis University), Edward Hackett (Heller School for Social Policy and Management, Brandeis University, Waltham, MA, USA), D Boyer (0000-0001-8944-406X, Rice University), Randal Hall (Rice University), Randal L Hall (Rice University), Matthew Schneider-Mayerson (0000-0002-7848-0759, Yale-NUS College), Albert Pope (Rice University), Akhil Gupta (0000-0002-3751-1600, Department of Anthropology, University of California, Los Angeles), Elizabeth Rodwell (0000-0002-5357-576X, Rice University), A Ballestero (0000-0001-7692-0514, Rice University), Trevor J Durbin (0000-0002-4804-2133, Kansas State University), Trevor Durbin (Kansas State University), Farès El-Dahdah (0000-0001-5847-0150, Rice University), Elizabeth Long (Rice University), Cyrus C M Mody (0000-0002-5266-5878, Maastricht University), Cyrus Mody (Maastricht University)
Year2016
Volume41
Issue3
Pages547-565
Publication date2016-05-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueScience Technology & Human Values (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0162-2439 • E-ISSN: 1552-8251
PublisherSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/0162243915620017
OpenAlexW2319801765
LanguageEN
Citations received182
References cited49

In recent years, a dramatic increase in the study of infrastructure has occurred in the social sciences and humanities, following upon foundational work in the physical sciences, architecture, planning, information science, and engineering. This article, authored by a multidisciplinary group of scholars, probes the generative potential of infrastructure at this historical juncture. Accounting for the conceptual and material capacities of infrastructure, the article argues for the importance of paradox in understanding infrastructure. Thematically the article is organized around three key points that speak to the study of infrastructure: ruin, retrofit, and risk. The first paradox of infrastructure, ruin, suggests that even as infrastructure is generative, it degenerates. A second paradox is found in retrofit, an apparent ontological oxymoron that attempts to bridge temporality from the present to the future and yet ultimately reveals that infrastructural solidity, in material and symbolic terms, is more apparent than actual. Finally, a third paradox of infrastructure, risk, demonstrates that while a key purpose of infrastructure is to mitigate risk, it also involves new risks as it comes to fruition. The article concludes with a series of suggestions and provocations to view the study of infrastructure in more contingent and paradoxical forms

Bridge (graph theory · Temporality · Geographies of human-animal interactions · Global Security and Public Health · Water Governance and Infrastructure

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