Exchange, obligation, accountability: Moral orders of technology repair in Kampala, Uganda

TL;DR

This paper explores the moral norms and ethical frameworks guiding repair practices in Kampala's mobile phone and computing markets, emphasizing fairness, collaboration, and accountability.

Contribution

It introduces the concept of moral orders of repair, detailing how informal rules shape repair work and moral economies in Kampala.

Findings

Identifies three key dimensions of moral orders: fair exchange, collaboration across hierarchy, relational accountability.

Shows how moral orders inform practical and ethical repair work.

Provides ethnographic insights into repair practices in Kampala.

Abstract

This chapter develops the concept of moral orders of repair, defined as the specific norms, rules, values, and expectations that structure and support joint work and exchange in repair worlds and other spheres of collaborative practice. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork in mobile phone and computing repair markets in Kampala, Uganda, we identify three key dimensions of moral orders: fair exchange, collaboration across hierarchy, and relational accountability. We show how moral orders provide a detailed specification of informal rules gestured as implicit in moral economies, and how these rules inform the practical and ethical work of repair.