Hacking Diversity: The Politics of Inclusion in Open Technology Cultures by Christina Dunbar-Hester (review)

Abstract

Reviewed by:

• Hacking Diversity: The Politics of Inclusion in Open Technology Cultures by Christina Dunbar-Hester
• Maria B. Garda (bio)

Hacking Diversity: The Politics of Inclusion in Open Technology Cultures By Christina Dunbar-Hester. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2020. Pp. 280.

The open technology movement brought us the Linux operating system and the Firefox web browser. Its historical roots reach deep into the hacker and hobbyist cultures of the twentieth century. Hence, perhaps not surprisingly, open technology communities are facing the same problem as many other DIY cultures: lack of diversity. Since the 2000s, these issues have been challenged by a growing number of activists and social change advocates. Their volunteer work within open technology groups is the topic of Hacking Diversity, written by the leading scholar on democratic [End Page 740] control, Christina Dunbar-Hester. In her book, she poses a simple yet increasingly relevant question: "What happens when ordinary people try to define and tackle a large social problem?" (p. 3).

In sociology, diversity reflects on the levels of inclusion of historically underrepresented groups in a social environment (e.g., workplace). Dunbar-Hester embraces diversity as an emic concept, "emanating from within the communities that form the subject of this study" (p. 17). There are arguably as many definitions of diversity as there are policymakers, but this kind of ethnographic approach allows the author to focus on the everyday practices of her respondents.

Influenced by works of Gabriella Coleman (Hacker, Hoaxer, Whistleblower, Spy, 2015) and Sarah Davies (Hackerspaces, 2017), this book is a result of many years of extensive fieldwork and historical contextualization. Each of the six main chapters of Hacking Diversity introduces the reader to various examples of hacking, making, and crafting practices and communities. I especially applaud the attention paid to hobbyists from underrepresented demographic groups and borderline interventions, such as the experimental cryptodance event in Montreal that "conjoined arts practice with pedagogy about the principles of cryptography in computing" (p. 96).

Dunbar-Hester directs much attention toward questions of social justice, and her observations are always framed with care and sensitivity toward the cultural complexity of the problem. The book is at its best when it critically investigates the relations of power in the open technology communities, be it online or in Brooklyn. To paraphrase the author, there is some deep irony in the fact that the previously discriminated social groups of geeks and nerds are now reproducing the dynamics of injustice within their own circles (p. 67). This kind of study will be of great value to future North American–oriented research, as it documents the diversity work within the hackerspaces at the time of the #MeToo and #BlackLivesMatter movements.

Hacking Diversity exposes the internal struggles of a community that, on the one hand, has a lot of utopian faith in technological solutions being able to make the world a better place and, on the other, is slowly beginning to recognize that there is no simple hack that could solve the systemic problems society is facing. As Dunbar-Hester observes, just because the problem persists within technology culture doesn't mean it can be solved with a technological fix (p. 241). Furthermore, she makes a fine point that the diversity advocates in tech are often engaging with neoliberal and corporate-friendly notions of inclusion that are limited to representation politics and do not address the underlying issues of global equity (ch. 5). After all, if we investigate who works in the technology sector on a global scale, who actually makes the devices we all use, then "women workers of color actually abound" (p. 20).

Overall, Hacking Diversity helps readers better understand the issues of diversity in the North American tech industry. It will prove to be a very useful resource for historians of technology, as it documents many ephemeral [End Page 741] events and communities. I hope the book will encourage more studies on local hacker culture, especially outside of the United States (such as Gerard Alberts and Ruth Oldenziel, eds., Hacking Europe, 2014), as well as on politics of inclusion in other areas of technology.

Maria B. Garda

Maria B. Garda is a postdoctoral researcher at the Centre of Excellence in Game Culture...