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

Descripción del proyecto

Descubrir los prejuicios, el poder y la justicia en un mundo visual

Las imágenes son fundamentales para la justicia. Ponen al descubierto la violencia, movilizan a la opinión pública y sirven como prueba en los tribunales. Sin embargo, lo que las imágenes muestran —y ocultan— depende del diseño de las cámaras, lo que tiene profundas implicaciones para la justicia. El equipo del proyecto Before the Image, financiado por el CEI, se pregunta: ¿qué hay detrás de la creación de imágenes para la justicia jurídica y social antes de que se capturen o se vean? En el proyecto se desarrollará una ontología política de la creación de imágenes y un enfoque metodológico innovador para explorar etnográficamente las nuevas tecnologías de la imagen y su impacto. De este modo, se mejorará la capacidad de las partes interesadas para abordar los sesgos y garantizar la justicia. En Before the Image se llevarán a cabo estudios etnográficos interdisciplinarios y colaborativos sobre la creación y el uso de imágenes para la justicia jurídica y social.

Objetivo

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.