Article:

Big Data und die Rückkehr des Positivismus. Zum gesellschaftlichen Umgang mit Daten

In order to develop some sort of provisional Data Critique, it seems necessary to identify the central concerns and issues that such an approach would have to cover. Looking at various stereotypes about „data“ in the public discourse, it becomes clear that a positivist tendency exists that obscures the real causes of the social problems associated with new data technologies. Given the increasing societal impact of Big Data applications, it is also necessary to develop a better vocabulary for describing the different ways in which data is handled. This article proposes that the vocabulary of Niklas Luhmann’s systems theory provides a useful conceptual basis for differentiating between the various ways in which data is recontextualized.