Computing, Complexity and Degrowth : Systemic Considerations for Digital De-escalation

TL;DR

This paper analyzes the complex relationship between digital technologies and systemic obstacles to digital de-escalation, proposing bottom-up strategies to reduce infrastructural and socio-political complexities for digital degrowth.

Contribution

It offers a systemic analysis of the links between complexity and computing, and proposes strategies for digital degrowth focusing on bottom-up simplification methods.

Findings

Complexity induces irreversibility in technological development.

Bottom-up approaches are more effective for digital de-escalation.

Strategies include developing tools for individuals to disengage from digital habits.

Abstract

Research on digital degrowth predominantly critiques digital expansion or presents alternative digital practices. Yet, analyzing the link between digital technologies and complexity is crucial to overcome systemic obstacles hindering digital de-escalation. This article presents the different types of links between complexity and computing observed in the literature: the infrastructural complexity inherent in digital technologies, the socio-political complexity induced by them, and finally, the ontological complexity (individual's ways of relating to their environment) hindered by digitization. The paper explores these links to identify ways to reduce infrastructural and socio-political complexities, and to move away from the reductionist paradigm, in order to support digital degrowth. Its development shows that complexity induces ratchet effects (i.e. irreversibilities in the development of a technique in a society), rendering degrowth efforts difficult to handle by individuals. Therefore, strategies to overcome these barriers are proposed, suggesting that bottom-up simplification approaches stand a greater chance of making alternatives emerge from different stakeholders (including users). This digital shift assumes the development of methods and technical tools that enable individuals to disengage from their attachments to digital habits and infrastructure, opening a substantial field of study.