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Before the Image: The Political Ontology of Image-Making for Legal and Social Justice

Objective

Image-capturing devices are in our hands and pockets, attached to buildings, vehicles, and bodies, and above us in the sky. They document violence, war crimes, and human rights abuses in images that are used in trials and for social justice. Despite their promise of truth, images are also recognised as biased, partial, and positioned. However, this has mainly been explored by studying images – or people engaged with taking or viewing them. To understand images for legal and social justice, we must study how biases, partialities, and positionalities of images are produced, not only in relation to taking and viewing images, but also in processes of designing image technologies and developing camera and visual literacy skills – what this project terms before the image. The project works ethnographically, cross-disciplinarily, and collaboratively. It subcontracts civil society actors to explore what goes into the making of images for legal and social justice before they are taken or seen.

The objectives are to:
- Develop a political ontology of image-making that expands conceptualisations of how, when, and by whom images are made. By looking beyond the situations immediately around the capturing and viewing of images, the project broadens understandings of the time, places, and actors involved in image-making.
- Develop and test an innovative methodological approach to ‘studying the future’. By subcontracting and collaborating with key image actors to develop sites for ethnographic exploration, the project gains unique access to the development of emerging image technologies.
- Enhance the capacity of stakeholders to address biases and promote justice. By providing actionable insight into the preconditions of image production, the project empowers civil society organisations, legal institutions, and tech developers to navigate the ethical and practical challenges associated with image making, supporting their work to make images less unjust and more useful for justice.

Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)

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Keywords

Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)

Programme(s)

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Topic(s)

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Funding Scheme

Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.

HORIZON-ERC - HORIZON ERC Grants

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Call for proposal

Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.

(opens in new window) ERC-2025-COG

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Host institution

KOBENHAVNS UNIVERSITET
Net EU contribution

Net EU financial contribution. The sum of money that the participant receives, deducted by the EU contribution to its linked third party. It considers the distribution of the EU financial contribution between direct beneficiaries of the project and other types of participants, like third-party participants.

€ 2 000 000,00
Address
NORREGADE 10
1165 KOBENHAVN
Denmark

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Region
Danmark Hovedstaden Byen København
Activity type
Higher or Secondary Education Establishments
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Total cost

The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.

€ 2 000 000,00

Beneficiaries (1)

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