Paratactic commoning: collective knowledge production networking as political struggle

ABSTRACT

Today we are confronted with an ever-increasing tactical control of rights to access, use and store data as a shared resource. Control of commons and commoning has never before been this computed, obfuscated and systematized in the history of mass communication. This article explores collective knowledge production networking, and self-organized community building, which are grounded on commons-based artistic intervention and political struggle. Focusing on the practices of Networks of Dispossession (2013 – present), which collectively compiles publicly available data and maps the exploitative and tactically obfuscated relations of capital and power in Turkey, findings reveal an emerging way of commoning that produces situated knowledges by information artifacts, material evidence, aesthetic forms and civic resistance. Departing from Science, Technology and Society (STS) studies, the article explores and introduces a distinctive notion of commoning, which is conceptualized as paratactic commoning.

KEYWORDS:

• Commons
• commoning
• data
• control
• tactic
• paratactic
• obfuscation

Acknowledgments

The author is grateful to all contributors of Amber Art and Technology Festival’12 as each one of them provided insight and expertise that greatly assisted the collaborative development of the concept, paratactic commons, although each one of them may not agree with all of the arguments and conclusions of this article.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. Networks of Dispossession was developed in phases and it is open to contributions. In 2013 it was created by Yaşar Adanalı, Burak Arıkan, Ozgul Şen, Zeyno Ustun, Ozlem Zıngıl and anonymous participants. Network mapping and analysis platform is provided by Graph Commons.

2. A small group of commoners, who had organized a sit-in to resist the unlawful privatization and demolition of the Gezi Park in Istanbul, was attacked by the police on May 28, 2013. In the following days, at least 235 protests were added to the Gezi Park Protests in other cities and villages in Turkey. Most of the commoning practices and protests in rural areas were against the growing power of government-corporation networks, which have been responsible for the increasing authoritative measures, corruption and the destruction of commons mainly caused by mega-construction sites, real estate and energy industries.

3. The emphasis is mine.

4. The emphasis is mine.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Ebru Yetiskin

Ebru Yetiskin is a researcher who works on the contemporary interactions of science, technology, art and politics. She studied Radio-TV-Cinema (BA) at Istanbul University; Science, Technology and Society (STS) at Université Louis-Pasteur and Istanbul Technical University (MA) and Sociology at Mimar Sinan Fine Arts University (Ph.d.). During her doctorate study, she worked as a visiting scholar in Centre de Sociologie de L'innovation in Ecoles des Mines de Paris. In 2010 she edited the first special issue on postcolonial thought in Turkey. To extend the scope of her research, she curated collective exhibitions entitled, Cacophony (2013), Code Unknown (2014), Waves (2015), X-CHANGE (2015), Illusionoscope (2017) and Interfaces (2018) in Istanbul. She also curated and directed Plugin New Media section of Contemporary Istanbul (2015) and Dystopie Sound Art Festival/Berlin (2018). She organized public programs, such as Paratactic Commons (2012), Contagious Bodies: Network Politics (2015–16), Contemporary Art: Yet Another (2016–18), Science, Technology, Society Talks (2017–present) and Contemporary Art: An Unknown (2019 – present). She edited a book of poetry, Like The Others (2016), written by an AI. She is a member of International Association of Art Critics (AICA), Femeeting – Women in Art, Science and Technology, and Istanbulab – Science, Technology and Society Platform in Turkey.