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                *Call for Papers*
<br>
<br>Workshop and Special Issue on
<br>
<br>*The Road to Autonomy?*
<br>
<br>*Autonomous Vehicles and Technologies Across East Asia in the 
<br>Twenty-First Century*
<br>
<br>/An international workshop to be held at/
<br>
<br>/The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Division of Social 
<br>Science/
<br>
<br>/27^th and 28^th February, 2020/
<br>
<br>We invite submissions for a workshop and subsequent special issue of a 
<br>Science & Technology-related journal devoted to self-driving vehicles 
<br>and technologies in East Asia in the twenty-first century.
<br>
<br>Scholars interested in participating in this workshop and special issue 
<br>should submit an abstract (at least 1,500 words) by *August 30, 2019*. 
<br>Authors will be notified by *September 27, 2019* if their papers have 
<br>been accepted for presentation at the workshop. There is no registration 
<br>fee. Airfare and up to three nights of hotel accommodation will be 
<br>provided. Complete drafts of the papers (comprising a minimum of 8,000 
<br>words in English including headings, references and footnotes) must be 
<br>submitted by *November 29, 2019*. All papers will be circulated among 
<br>the participants in advance and participants are expected to comment 
<br>extensively at the workshop on each other’s papers; discussion is a key 
<br>objective and element of this workshop. A subset of authors will be 
<br>asked to submit their papers for inclusion in the special issue by 
<br>*January 31, 2020*, with the expectation that their papers will be 
<br>published by late-2020, provided they pass the external review process.
<br>
<br>*/Overview/*
<br>
<br>This workshop will investigate the emergence and development of the 
<br>autonomous vehicle (AV) industry across East Asia in the twenty-first 
<br>century.
<br>
<br>The development of an autonomous vehicle (AV) industry is important for 
<br>many nations as they seek preparedness for the Fourth Industrial 
<br>Revolution, an era defined by rapid advances in numerous technologies, 
<br>notably intelligent computing technologies such as artificial 
<br>intelligence (AI), robotics and the Internet of Things (IoT). All are 
<br>central to the AV industry; indeed, across East Asia today, China, Japan 
<br>and South Korea already have AV plans and impressive progress with 
<br>regard to technology development, infrastructure considerations as well 
<br>as policy and regulation.
<br>
<br>The excitement surrounding AVs is understandable; they are hailed for 
<br>their many perceived benefits. As electric vehicles (EVs), they help 
<br>reduce emissions; as ride-hailing fleets, they help reduce automobile 
<br>ownership and alleviate urban congestion, thereby improving the 
<br>experience of public space; and as self-driving vehicles they provide 
<br>mobility to previously marginalised groups such as the elderly and 
<br>people with disabilities whom are unable to drive automobiles today. 
<br>Importantly, if successful, AVs offer the promise of safety and 
<br>significantly less—perhaps zero—accident fatalities. But are these 
<br>assessments too optimistic? Is too much expected from AV technologies? 
<br>AV technologies are not, after all, sentient beings but assemblages of 
<br>various technologies that are “programed” by humans.
<br>
<br>*/Workshop Scope/*
<br>
<br>The goal of this workshop is to deliberate theoretical and empirical 
<br>research findings with a view to identifying regulations and policies 
<br>that can facilitate the broad-based development of the AV industry 
<br>across East Asia. This may include, but is not limited to, questions 
<br>pertaining to business models, ethics, profitability as well as 
<br>transparency.
<br>
<br>Broadly speaking, our goal is to investigate how AV technologies are 
<br>imagined, conceptualised, designed, manufactured and ultimately deployed 
<br>and used. Rather than view the development of AV technologies as 
<br>occurring in a vacuum, we wish to pay attention to all agents involved 
<br>in conceiving and producing AV technologies, human and non-human, the 
<br>dialectic nature of these processes and the underlying values and 
<br>judgements explicated by different actors throughout these processes. 
<br>Actor-Network Theory (e.g. Latour 2005), for example, seeks to unravel 
<br>how technologies become—or are “translated” into—objects that are used 
<br>in daily lives and the complex network of actors involved in this 
<br>process. Notions of “domestication” (e.g. Silverstone and Hirsch 1992), 
<br>moreover, similarly seek to unravel the complex and unique ways in which 
<br>a new technology becomes part of peoples’ daily lives in a particular 
<br>society by examining the symbolic, practical and cognitive processes 
<br>involved.
<br>
<br>We see two broad areas of initial and promising inquiry. First, 
<br>/infrastructure and environmental factors/ and, by extension, the 
<br>relationship the AV industry and its technologies have with Smart City 
<br>agendas and surveillance proclivities. AVs use a combination of 
<br>technologies including hardware (e.g. cameras, radars, sensors), 
<br>software (e.g. algorithms that determine behaviour, navigational 
<br>systems), mechanics and others; these are both internal and external to 
<br>the AV. In fact, there is a continuum in the degree to which an AV 
<br>relies on internal versus external technologies to operate; the more an 
<br>AV relies on its external environment, the less its need for certain 
<br>internal technologies (and the cheaper it may become). Competitive 
<br>advantage may reside along this continuum; some nations need to 
<br>retro-fit existing road networks to accommodate AVs while other nations 
<br>can build new road networks that are AV-ready from day one. In doing so, 
<br>some nations can leverage existing infrastructure built for different 
<br>purposes—such as surveillance cameras—to fast track AV deployment. As 
<br>this shows, AVs do operate “autonomously” at all but are instead 
<br>embedded inside complex material and computational networks that hide 
<br>institutional and personal hierarchies, relationships and experiences 
<br>(Zuboff 2019). This workshop welcomes papers that explore these and 
<br>related topics.
<br>
<br>Second, investigations into /human-AV technologies interaction/—whether 
<br>as passengers or as drivers of other vehicles, cyclists, pedestrians and 
<br>so on—and how this feeds back into technology conception and development 
<br>(Hancock 2018; Stayton, Cefkin and Zhang 2017; Vinkhuyzen and Cefkin 
<br>2016). This is especially important given that the industry is focused 
<br>on developing Level 4 AV technologies, defined as vehicles than can 
<br>drive themselves in many circumstances without needing to ask the 
<br>passenger to take over. As this shows, Level 4 AVs necessitate a 
<br>fundamental shift in human-automobile interactions and mobility 
<br>practices. We are interested in actors’ assumptions concerning 
<br>human-technology interactions—and the values these assumptions reveal—as 
<br>they go about imagining, conceptualising, designing, manufacturing and 
<br>deploying AV technologies. What are the political, economic, social and 
<br>cultural assumptions underlying these processes? How might these differ 
<br>between different actors (e.g. automobile makers versus software 
<br>companies; users versus investors; etc. At the very least, we seek to 
<br>identify and discuss users and non-users and their relationship to AV 
<br>technology development (Oudshoorn and Pinch 2003).
<br>
<br>*/Summary of Objectives/*
<br>
<br>These are but two broad areas we are interested in receiving submissions 
<br>on. As the goal of this workshop is to deliberate theoretical and 
<br>empirical research findings with a view to identifying regulations and 
<br>policies that can facilitate the broad-based development of the AV 
<br>industry across East Asia, other topics and questions we are interested 
<br>in are (but not limited to):
<br>
<br>·How are AV regulatory and policy frameworks developed, what does this 
<br>reveal about attitudes toward the Fourth Industrial Revolution and what 
<br>path dependencies, national values and other priorities does it 
<br>explicate (either single-case or comparative in nature)?;
<br>
<br>·How are specific AV technologies developed? Which actors are involved, 
<br>and which are not? What global and/or regional production networks 
<br>exist? Are there any transparency and/or ethical concerns? How does this 
<br>configuration assist AV industry development and how might it be improved?;
<br>
<br>·How are AV users and non-users—of private vehicles, public 
<br>transpiration vehicles or industry specific vehicles—conceived of and 
<br>incorporated into technology development? How do users and non-users 
<br>respond to and interact with AV technologies?’ and
<br>
<br>·This workshop is interested in autonomous vehicles in a broad sense and 
<br>is not limited to private vehicles; we welcome submissions from scholars 
<br>researching other autonomous vehicle applications such as public 
<br>transportation, logistics and manufacturing, agriculture, , for example.
<br>
<br>*/Submission Procedures/*
<br>
<br>To submit an abstract for consideration for the workshop, please attach 
<br>your abstract to an e-mail and send it to Sacha Cody (sachacody@ust.hk 
<br>). In the subject line of the e-mail, please 
<br>write: _MMEA AV Workshop: The Title of Your Paper_.
<br>
<br>Please note your abstract should include the title of the paper, all 
<br>author(s) names and affiliations as well as contact information. It 
<br>should contain clear information on the research method(s), data 
<br>source(s), analytical tool(s) and theoretical framework(s) to be used.
<br>
<br>Please note we are seeking original contributions; papers that have 
<br>already been published or submitted for publication will not be accepted.
<br>
<br>/** NOTE: The organising committee (Sacha Cody and Naubahar Sharif) 
<br>welcomes emails to informally discuss ideas prior to the submission of a 
<br>proposal. Please write to Sacha and he will respond to all inquiries 
<br>promptly. **/
<br>
<br>Highest priority will be given to papers that combine a general 
<br>theoretical discussion with new empirical findings as well as policy and 
<br>regulatory implications. Papers may be based on new comparative research 
<br>as well as single-case studies, and on qualitative as well as 
<br>quantitative research methods.
<br>
<br>This workshop is funded by the /Making Modernity in East Asia (MMEA): 
<br>technologies of everyday life, 19^th – 21^st centuries/ 
<br>(https://mmea.hku.hk; RGC CRF HKU C7011–16G) research project. This is a 
<br>collaborative research project between The University of Hong Kong and 
<br>The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. The main objective 
<br>of this collaborative research project is to establish a new, 
<br>interdisciplinary way of understanding East Asian modernity through the 
<br>lens of everyday technology.
<br>
<br>Workshop participants’ work will be viewed by the broader MMEA team 
<br>(https://mmea.hku.hk/about-the-project/project-team/). Workshop 
<br>participants may have the opportunity to liaise and meet with other team 
<br>members while in Hong Kong.
<br>
<br>*References*
<br>
<br>Hancock, Peter A. 2018. /Some Pitfalls in the Promises of Automated and 
<br>Autonomous Vehicles/. Ergonomics DOI: 10.1080/00140139.2018.1498136.
<br>
<br>Latour, Bruno. 2005. /Reassembling the Social: an introduction to 
<br>actor-network theory/. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
<br>
<br>Oudshoorn, Nelly and Trevor Pinch. Eds. 2003. /How Users Matter: the 
<br>co-construction of users and technology/. Massachusetts: The MIT Press.
<br>
<br>Silverstone, Roger and Eric Hirsch. /Eds/. 1992. /Consuming 
<br>Technologies: media and information in domestic spaces/. London: Routledge.
<br>
<br>Stayton, Erik, Melissa Cefkin and Jingyi Zhang. 2017. Autonomous 
<br>Individuals in Autonomous Vehicles: The Multiple Autonomies of 
<br>Self-Driving Cars. /Ethnographic Praxis in Industry Conference 
<br>Proceedings /92–110.
<br>
<br>Vinkhuyzen, Erik and Melissa Cefkin. 2016. Developing Socially 
<br>Acceptable Autonomous Vehicles. /Ethnographic Praxis in Industry 
<br>Conference Proceedings/ 522–534.
<br>
<br>Zuboff, Shoshana. 2019. /The Age of Surveillance Capitalism: the fight 
<br>for a human future at the new frontier of power/. New York: PublicAffairs.
<br>
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