Tech Refactored

S2E17 - Societies of Subjugation: Xinjiang and Beyond with Khaled Beydoun

November 24, 2021 Nebraska Governance and Technology Center Season 2 Episode 17
Tech Refactored
S2E17 - Societies of Subjugation: Xinjiang and Beyond with Khaled Beydoun
Show Notes Transcript

 This weeks host, Kyle Langvardt, sits down with his friend Khaled Beydoun to discuss Islamophobia and surveillance. Beydoun is the author of the critically acclaimed American Islamophobia: Understanding the Roots and Rise of Fear and co-editor of Islamophobia and the Law. His next book, The New Crusades: Islamophobia, the World and the Wars Between will be published in 2021 with the University of California Press.

Disclaimer: This transcript is auto-generated and has not been thoroughly reviewed for completeness or accuracy.

[00:00:00] Kyle Langvardt: This is Tech Refactored. I'm your host. Kyle Langvardt. I'm a faculty member at the Nebraska Governance and Technology Center, and I'm so pleased to be here to introduce you to a friend and former colleague of mine. His name's Kahled Baydoun. He's a native of Detroit. He's a professor of law at Wayne State University and there he's a leading scholar on national security, the war on terror and Civil Rights. 

He is the author of the critically acclaimed American Islamophobia, Understanding the Roots and Rise of Fear, and he is the co-editor of Islamophobia and the Law, which is a critical reader published by Cambridge University Press. His next book is titled The New Crusades, Islamophobia, the World, and The [00:01:00] Wars in Between.

And it'll be published in 2021 with the University of California Press. Co welcome to the show. Yeah. Thanks so much for having me. I've read a lot of your work and, and followed it for a long time. And, uh, you've written pretty extensively about the effects of law enforcement and specifically the, uh, countering violent extremism program on the ordinary lives of.

Muslims and and Arab Americans. Could you talk a little bit about the, the role that you think official state policy plays in shaping our understandings of Muslim identity? A considerable 

[00:01:43] Khaled Beydoun: role post nine 11 state. It, you know, constructed a new architecture for policing, terrorism and conflated terrorism with, with Muslim identity.

And programs like countering violent extremism were very much the, the, uh, the legal spearhead [00:02:00] of surveillance within Muslim American geographies, Moss Community Centers, student associations. 

[00:02:04] Kyle Langvardt: When we talk about countering violent extremism, what do you mean? It was a program 

[00:02:10] Khaled Beydoun: that was, uh, spearheaded by the N Y P D in the direct aftermath of post nine 11, but then it became federal policy during the Obama years, President Obama made it a the Signature Counter Terror Policing program under his administration.

It's a program where the FBI works closely with local law enforcement. To develop relationships, seed informants and data gatherers within Muslim American spaces to essentially to essentially identify individuals who might have a propensity for radicalization and terrorism. 

[00:02:41] Kyle Langvardt: Interesting that you say, This was President Obama's flagship.

Program on, on this front. Uh, what, what was going on under, under President Bush and what do you think inspired President Obama to move in this direction? Well, there, there was 

[00:02:56] Khaled Beydoun: a major structural and rhetorical shift from [00:03:00] Bush to Obama. You know, Bush obviously pioneered and established the modern counter terrorist state by establishing, uh, the Department of Home, Department of Homeland Security, you know, lobbied for the enactment of strident legislation like the Patriot.

Other sweeping immigration policies well built on the sort of ideological worldview of a clash of civilizations. We saw President Obama retrench that disposition and introduce a new perspective whereby give us really wonderful speech at Chiro University months into his presidency where he says it was time to sort of work towards coexistence between.

The United States and the Muslim American population, and this mess, this message of harmony and coexistence basically laid the ideological groundwork where the state, the new administration led by Obama could include members of the Muslim community to function as interlocutors native informants. That would become the sort of on the ground.

Eyes and on ground sort of [00:04:00] catalysts to carry forward, uh, new surveillance programs that work closely with the state. So it was a structural shift, an ideological shift, but it was still a continuation of the war on Terror ba, you know, built upon this, the same presumption that Muslim identities and expression of Muslim identity was closely correlated, terrorism.

[00:04:20] Kyle Langvardt: And it's, it's interesting because I think. At the time, at least as as I remember it, this countering violent extremism approach. Was framed as maybe a walk back or a more moderate alternative to, uh, this kind of, uh, clash of civilization's mentality that seemed to motivate so much of the, the Bush administration and, and it's public representations about these issues.

I mean, you, you see it even in the, in, in the name countering violent extremism. It's like there's this painstaking effort to describe this in neutral terms. Mm-hmm. , but in some of, in some of. Your work, I almost get a sense that you think the the Countering [00:05:00] violent extremism program might have amplified.

The, the state's role in, in defining Muslim Muslim identity and, and introducing some new level of, of precarity into the lives of, of Muslims and even non-Muslim, Arab, Arab Americans. Is that, is that accurate? It is accurate. I, 

[00:05:19] Khaled Beydoun: I, I consider, Coning violent extremism to be more nefarious than its precedent policies on a number of fronts.

The principle reason why that is, is because the program in the Obama administration. Really capitalized on Muslims in a way that previous policies couldn't. Right. So there was this almost, there was, I, there was this idea under the Obama administration that we could mobilize members of the Muslim community to do our dirty work for us.

And as a consequence of that, you know, approach, uh, there was this divide and conquer strategy, right. That they were honing in on, on members, members of the [00:06:00] community. Who could be mobilized spies on grounds of sectarian division. So members of the Shia Muslim community were mobilized to become informants against, um, members of the SUNY community.

If states different Muslim majority states had some sort of rivalry or tension, for instance, places like Detroit, the program mobilized members of the Iraqi. Community to, uh, keep tabs on members of the Palestinian or Egyptian community. So by virtue of, by virtue of honing in on fissures and divisions within the broader Muslim American milieu, countering violent, violent extremism had the short term objective of creating informants within the Muslim American community.

But the long term objective of really caring forward this broader objective of Divide, Divide, and. , if you will. So that's why as a consequence of the program SEC sectarianism is at, is at an all time high within the Muslim American community, Cross national and cross ethnic and racial tension is at an [00:07:00] all time high.

All of these divisions are spawned by this honing in on fissures within the community to carry forward the objective of counter terrorism under the. Of countering, uh, violent extremism. And, 

[00:07:15] Kyle Langvardt: you know, maybe after the, after the break, we'll have an opportunity to talk about some of these, some of these themes more generally in, in the context of, of surveillance programs by, by governments, you know, it's off framed as a more kind of, uh, uh, humane.

Gentler, maybe less physically violent, alternative to policing the public or policing a particular community. Mm-hmm. , but it's kind of, uh, subtle subtler approach. Winds up, winds up working a more kind of lasting damage. I guess one, one question that I have after, after hearing you talk about, uh, CVE 

[00:07:54] Khaled Beydoun: is.

[00:07:56] Kyle Langvardt: What effect do you think this has had on the nature [00:08:00] of Muslim identity? And so you, you've written quite a bit about Muslim I identity what it means to, uh, See oneself as, as Muslim, what it means to perform mu Muslim identity. What, what it means to present yourself as maybe the kind of Muslim who is not a, a, a problem for public, public policy.

You know, who, who's, who's less, less threatening to state. Do you think that the countering violent extremism program has changed in some sense what it means to be a Muslim in the United States? Well, first what it did is it, it, 

[00:08:43] Khaled Beydoun: it entrenched this binary that there are good and bad Muslims. That was established by the Bush administration.

Right. And specific. Expressions of Muslim identity that aligned with patriotism, that aligned with, um, you know, not taking a critical disposition [00:09:00] against domestic, American domestic reform policy would sort of brand you as, or not expressing your religious identity in, in conspicuous ways. Whether it's, uh, wearing the hijab for a woman or more traditional forms of covering for women, for men, not dawning a long beard, not wearing tradit.

Clothing. Uh, in addition to expression, not being involved with specific organizations or associations or mosques that are viewed with suspicion by the state, were sort of delineated by this binary that that is established in the post nine 11 moment where if you're a good Muslim, there's a, uh, there you're sort of.

Exempt or not viewed at the same level of scrutiny by this state. But if you're a bad Muslim, somebody who's engaged in dissent, somebody was keen on exercising her, his religion freely, then you might be viewed as a bad Muslim. What counter radicalization does is it, it, it entrenches this binary. . Right.

But it also introduces a, a greater chilling effect because it's no longer a dialectic between the state and the [00:10:00] Muslim American population. It becomes like this tri parrot dialectic where the Muslim is performing his or her identity in ways that is, that is in line with. Or against stigma coming from the state, but also in line with stigma coming with from within members of the Muslim American community, which function as a watchdog, right?

Which function as a proxy for the state. So CVE makes it far more difficult for Muslims and specifically, and there's, there's kind of a layered dimension of this, right? So immigrant Muslims, black Muslim, Poor and working class Muslims who occupy distinct or intersecting vulnerabilities their ability to exercise their faith becomes chilled and scrutinized far more closely.

Their ability to express other First Amendment liberties like speech assembly and organizing become far more suspicious. CVE makes the policing far more. Intimate. Mm-hmm. and [00:11:00] more piercing because it's members of your own flock, if you will, that become the collateral policemen and women dissecting and analyzing everything it is you do.

[00:11:10] Kyle Langvardt: Yeah, and I mean, as a free speech scholar, I can see pretty obvious parallels here to insights from free speech jurisprudence. If you tell a a book. That it has a responsibility to root out obscene books. Mm-hmm. , well, it's gonna go and find the obscene books and, and then some, it's going to, uh, it's, it's going to chill All kinds of, all kinds of other publications.

Yep. And then authors of books who want to sell to, to book sellers are going to impose an internal censorship on themselves with, uh, what, what they write. And so whatever the state's objectives are, good, good or bad, this kind. Informal approach results in, in private censorship and, and, and self censorship that it can definitely have out out outsized effects on, on rights and personal [00:12:00] freedoms.

[00:12:00] Khaled Beydoun: Yeah. And you see, you see routine sort of performances against. , these stigmas ordained by the state, uh, in very stark ways, especially as professors. Right. So I've known students who have changed their names, Muslim students who have changed their names, so they appear to be less Muslim. Um, Muslim students remove their hijab, so they, they, they, they appear to be less Muslim, Muslim students choosing to not be involved with specific organizations like the Muslim Student Association.

Mm-hmm. So they, you know, essentially protect themselves from the possibility of being, uh, viewed as problematic or suspicious by, by the state. So there's a whole range of like everyday routine performances that we can, uh, identify. That manifest how, how far reaching this intrusion or this conflation of Muslim identity with terrorism, you know, scribes, the different Muslim identities and performances.

[00:12:53] Kyle Langvardt: And when you, when you talk about there being a, a, a dialectic between, Th this kind of state [00:13:00] action and this kind of pri- private or, or societal action. But could you just kinda explain to the listeners what you mean by that, by that dialectic and, and why it's important to think of this as dialectical? I think what 

[00:13:14] Khaled Beydoun: undergirds every Islamophobic policy that's been enacted in the post 9/11 moment.

Like if you were to ask me what the sort of logical foundation or the baseline foundation of each policy, , whether it's the Patriot Act or the the Muslim ban, whether it's countering violent extremism or n Sears, the National Security E Exit Entry registration system. What undergirds all of these policies, even the creation of the Department of Homeland Security, right beyond policy, but restructuring of national security apparatuses and institutions in the country, is this idea.

That expressions of Muslim identity, specific expressions of Muslim identity are correlated to terrorism. Right. And that's how I define Islamophobia. That's the foundational definition that I, that I advance in my work of what Islamophobia [00:14:00] is. So that is, that is the fundamental heuristic or idea that is expressed by the state.

What It enacts all of these policies. I mean, a as as law scholars, we know that law is. Than just dictates that exist on, you know, on pages, right? Or exists by way of, you know, court decisions or, or legislation law, more broadly speaking, is a communicate, it's a discourse, right? Mm-hmm. , it's, it disseminates specific messages.

To the polity at large and the the fundamental message or dialectic that the state is disseminating not only to the polity at large, but to Muslim specifically, is if you practice your way, your religion in this way, then there's a strong likelihood that you will be policed in this way. So that is the fundamental dialectic emanating from this broader architecture of Islamophobia that's been established post nine 11.

And now we just sort of like commemorated the two decades. Tenure of the war on terror. So it's existed for more than [00:15:00] two, for more than 20 years now. Yeah. I mean, a 

[00:15:02] Kyle Langvardt: couple thoughts. One is just one, one thing that we always kind of harp on in this, in this center is this idea that, that, uh, governance is not just.

Limited to public law. It's not just limited to, to private governance. Yeah. You know, governance is ultimately about these interlocking relationships between governance institutions and so I, I think I, I, I hear you saying that when the government adopts one set of policies that are, are designed or have the effect of governing Muslims in, in this way or that way.

It's going to have causal effects on other governing institutions beyond the government, private institutions. You can almost even, you could almost talk about internal psychology as a kind of, uh, self, self-governing institution, and that the multiplication effect from those downstream effects can, can be really devastating.

I guess the other, the other thing, and this, it kinda leads into maybe where we're, we're going after the [00:16:00] break, is that this really demonstrates how. Narrow it is to think of privacy as just a matter of the government listening in and fi finding out things that we don't want, want the government to hear, or even a private institution listening in.

Maybe that's disturbing or. Or, or creepy to think of the government surveilling, surveilling a mosque. But what I hear you saying is that we can't think of this as just a, a passive thing that, uh, what surveillance really does is it operates as an insidious mechanism of, of control that can have much more active than, than passive effects.

Mm-hmm. on human behavior. Yeah. No, I definitely 

[00:16:46] Khaled Beydoun: agree. And it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's not linear, right? Surveillance is no longer linear. It's now sort of a collaborative monster where the surveilled is actually partaking in his or her surveillance. I think [00:17:00] it's fu quo who said mm-hmm. , right? That the, the agent becomes a principal in his own surveillance.

And that's what the modern national. War terror apparatus has done specifically counter radicalization with Muslim communities. They've become the principle agents of their own surveillance. 

[00:17:15] Kyle Langvardt: Well, and I think that's gonna lead us into the next segment where I want to talk about, um, your, your concept of societies of subjugation, which builds on, on some of these faco ideas.

We'll be right back to discuss societies of subjugation further with cod baydoon.

[00:17:36] Paige Ross: I'm Paige Ross, a student fellow at the Nebraska Governance and Technology Center. The student fellows at the center are drawn from across the University of Nebraska, including the colleges of law, business engineering, and journalism, and mass communications. In the program, we develop research projects focused on the intersection of society and technology, and working in multidisciplinary teams, think about [00:18:00] how to communicate our work to the world.

Some of this year's subjects include designing autonomous vehicles with drivers in mind. Satellite congestion and low earth orbit, and taking the politics out of online content moderation. We have some fun and network with fellow students and faculty too. The program is open to graduate or law students at the University of Nebraska and welcome students from all departments.

Now back to this episode of Tech Refactored. 

[00:18:28] Kyle Langvardt: So in the last segment we talked about the countering violent extremism. Program, which we typically think of as a, uh, a surveillance program, which, which of course it is. But you think of this surveillance program as more importantly, a, a, a catalyst for. The people being surveilled to act in a certain way, to censor their own behavior and to to censor each other.

And you've talked [00:19:00] about the kind of fracturing effect that that has among Muslim communities, maybe among Arab, Arab communities. I wanna talk about a program that really seems to take this kind of surveillance approach. To the next level, and that is the surveillance of Uyghur Muslims in Xinjiang China.

Could you tell me just a, a little bit about what's going on in Xinjiang province and the ways that China has gone beyond the kind of surveillance programs that we're familiar with? 

[00:19:34] Khaled Beydoun: Mm-hmm. Yeah. So my work on American Islamophobia, uh, pushed me to think about what's happening in different countries with regard to.

Distinct regimes of Islamophobia, but also case studies where the American War on Terror was facilitating or emboldening Islamophobia in other parts of the world. And then that took me to, that took me to China. [00:20:00] The War on Terror sort of opened the door for. , the communist regime in China to intensify its crackdown on, uh, this population who are living in northwest state, Northwest China called gin gen.

[00:20:15] Kyle Langvardt: And just to be clear, so when you say it opened the door mm-hmm. for China, China to do that. Mm-hmm. Uh, could, could you elaborate on, on that? 

[00:20:24] Khaled Beydoun: Sure. Yeah, so before nine 11, uh, Chi China fixated on this uighur Muslim population and this uighur Muslim population are predominantly Muslim. They belong to a Turkic ethnic group that are distinct from the Han Majority, right?

The Han majority control the communist, uh, government in China, and, uh, who comprised the biggest demographic majority in China and the Chinese regime. Cracking down on Uighur Muslims before nine 11 and cast them as sort of a rival racial group. Mm-hmm. , uh, in terms of like them being gangs, [00:21:00] mafia's, subversive.

But after nine 11, the lexicon and the framework, you know, pushed by the United States to think about Muslim identities in terms of terrorism was adopted by the Chinese. , which enabled the regime to sort of intensify its persecution of this population under the umbrella of counter-terrorism.  

[00:21:21] Kyle Langvardt: And were, did the Chinese leadership perceive some kind of diplomatic benefits or something that that could flow from that in terms of relations with the US?

[00:21:29] Khaled Beydoun: Strategic alliance with the United States on grounds of counter-terrorism.

But the greatest benefit, uh, was the idea that they can. Try to stamp out this population that they've been keen on stamping out for decades. I mean, I think it's a, a good point of departure is to recognize that Jinja was once a independent state after the independence of China for several years. But then when, when the regime recognized its political and economic richness that came with the state, they, they remixed it [00:22:00] because it had so much rich natural resources, Considerable geographic importance in terms of where it's located.

But it also, it, it intersected with, China's regional and imperial objectives in the region. So China want to reclaim it. And since the fifties, there's been this battle between the, the, the Uighur Muslims, um, who have quested for self-determination in the state, who have looked to maintain it as part of the motherland.

So the war on terror just essentially opened the door and extended carb launched to the regime to crack down on this population. In ways that were, um, not possible before nine 11. 

[00:22:36] Kyle Langvardt: Okay. So in, in terms of international perceptions, this was an opportunity for China to crack down with relative impunity.

And so then what, what does that crackdown look like? What it looks like 

[00:22:51] Khaled Beydoun: today is that jinja in its big cities like a roomie, have become incubators for the most [00:23:00] cutting edge in modern forms of digital surveillance. Known to man their, their laboratories for the state and authoritarian government, which doesn't have the same kind of legal and constitutional constraints that we have or theoretically have here in the United States.

Uh, to use digital technologies in ways to construct a total surveillance state to, you know, mon not only monitor the movement and track the activity, uh, of Regur Muslims living within this digital panopticon, but beyond that collect. Collect biometric data, predict the behaviors via algorithms, and essentially look to silence, chill, not only advocacy and dissent, but expressions of Muslim identity as the state has.

Closely conflated with subversion in terrorism with the ultimate objective of, uh, cultural ethnic cleansing. And you see that most starkly through the construction of these prison camps, where allegedly [00:24:00] one to 3 million vier Muslims have been placed into which function concentration camps today. So there are many tentacles of this, you know, modern subjugation society, which we can talk about more closely.

That rely heavily on this digital architecture of surveillance. 

[00:24:17] Kyle Langvardt: Okay. And you mentioned, uh, you, you mentioned Fuko earlier before the, before the break, and I'm. Uh, it, it's been a long, a long time, uh, since I, I read this, but I, 

[00:24:33] Khaled Beydoun: I, as I remember, and 

[00:24:36] Kyle Langvardt: partially, I'm going off of something I read very recently of yours, so, but, but as I remember from, from my, my own reading of Fuco, one of his themes in writing about surveillance was that this was, in some sense a more humane way for the state to exercise.

Power he wrote on Jeremy Bentham's, [00:25:00] panopticon. This, this prison where the, the prison doesn't have to hire as many guards because a single guard can just watch the prisoners. And the prisoners know that they're being watched and, and they self-regulate. Yep. But one of the big assumptions in all of this is that the state is not combin.

This subtle surveillance technique with actual physical violence. Mm-hmm. . And so you have this concept of the subjugation society where you kind of try to, to move beyond some of this existing scholarship on, on, on surveillance and, uh, the, the ways it operates. Could, could you describe some of the, some of these distinctions between the subjugation society and the kind of surveillance society?

Fuko is discussing. Yeah, I'll try my 

[00:25:51] Khaled Beydoun: best to make this theory like , like it's accessible and understandable is possible. But what, what really frustrated me when I was reading and look, [00:26:00] look, you know, Michelle Fuko is kind of the founding father of how we think about surveillance, discipline, and punishment.

And people like Jill Deus, right, who talk. The control society and how the corporation today, everyone's watched the social dilemma. Mm-hmm. , right? And how companies like Facebook, Twitter, these big tech giants now, um, have become the primary. purveyors and surveyors of the subject today. I think what frustrated me in where I found limitations with Fuco and Jill Deus, and, and they're, they have a colloque between them, right?

Mm-hmm. , the colloquy between them, presum presumes that the more advanced and cutting edge of technology becomes. . Right. And Fuca, the, the, the principle technology of surveillance was the prison, right? Mm-hmm. , he fixated on the prison as being no longer a space of, uh, confinement, uh, and punitive retribution, but a new space for surveillance and essentially says what you just said, that we no longer have to punish these people.

[00:27:00] We don't gotta torture them. Mm-hmm. , we don't gotta, like, you know, walk them down into the gallows and inflict physical punishment upon them because this watch tower in the. leads to the process of the individual always knowing he or she's being watched, and then based on that consciousness becomes his or own his or her own check on what they do and don't do.

Another scholar that I read that examines race more closely, Simone Brown wrote about the experience of blackness to say, Hey, hold up Fuco, hold up du lose This notion that the more advanced technology becomes a less reliance on physical punishment. Um, is not true when it comes to black people, right? If you look at the experience of black people, even today, the ensemble of punishment, discipline, and control is simultaneous.

It exists in conjunction at once when the targets and the victims are black. So I built upon that to say what is problematic about Fuko is that. He, he imagined surveillance through the linear lens of the [00:28:00] subject being white and within a Western context, my subjugation society. , we shouldn't presume that the target or subject of surveillance is always white.

And second, we shouldn't always presume that the space or site of surveillance is a western cont western country, like the uk, France, or the United States. It might be author an authoritarian country like China. And once we take the site of surveillance, From the west into a space like China and take the subject of surveillance away from the imagined white subject to a non-white subject.

We can also see how there's this ensemble of surveillance where the state unleashes simultaneously violence, uh, discipline and control to achieve its objective. Demystifying the idea that advancements in technology always retrench, reliance on. punishment. Mm-hmm. . 

[00:28:50] Kyle Langvardt: Yeah. I mean, when you, when you go back and you, uh, revisit some of that earlier theory, they, I mean, they do seem to have this insight that maybe surveillance creates opportunities to [00:29:00] deescalate violence.

But yeah, I mean, on, on reflection, uh, those, those same kinds of technologies can be used to perfect a, a, a system of physical violence. 

[00:29:10] Khaled Beydoun: And I don't think fu quo was saying that advancements in technology render violence. Obsolete. But I think a conclusion he, he had, was it renders violence, aberrational mm-hmm.

or deviate, no longer the, uh, the predicted sort of outcome of the surveillance system. And I think that's, that's untrue, right? Mm-hmm. , that's what Brown said, is untrue for black people. Mm-hmm. . And that's what I'd say is untrue for non-white. Populations and non-Western contexts. So 

[00:29:38] Kyle Langvardt: if, when you talk about the, the subjugation society as distinguished from the, uh, surveillance society or, or the control society, you're talking about a, a society in which surveillance is being used.

To meet out violence, [00:30:00] meet out, violence differential along, along racial lines. Is this a society where surveillance is being used to define or create race? That's 

[00:30:13] Khaled Beydoun: an interesting question. I think that, you know, in, in Raha, Benjamin has written in her, in her book How Race is. Form of technology in and of itself, where by the state, you know, deploys it to create divisions and stratifications amongst the population.

I think that's true in China, right? Because in many respects, the surveillance technologies have become racialized tools that are able to detect, uh, specific phenotype. In physical descriptors, the technology designed by companies like Huawei or Alibaba are able to, to identify, uh, a we or Muslim as opposed to Ahan Muslim.

Mm-hmm. a we Muslim away from a [00:31:00] Uighur or a Tibetan, for instance. So the, the technology have become deeply racialized, an engineered to make those distinctions. So my, my guess is, Looking ahead in China, but also in the United States. Right. And, you know, race is, and racism are, are fluid. Right. They change over time.

Mm-hmm. that technology and given that techno technologies and digital surveillance tools are gonna become the new, even in the states, big data policing use of algorithms are, are gonna become the new sort of tools for surveillance and policing moving ahead as state, as national security and criminal threats.

because of the fluidity of race and racism. It's not unlikely. And it's, it's possibly even likely to think that the technologies can determine or reshape how we think about racial classifications 

[00:31:49] Kyle Langvardt: today. Race is basically a matter of, uh, perception and, and. And self perception. The power to surveil a person or, or to control public [00:32:00] public perceptions does seem like a power to, to police and determine racial categories or maybe even o other categories that don't operate quite like race.

Uh, I noticed that, that in, in your paper, you. suggested that the society of of subjugation might find other types of lines to draw within the society and maybe treat them, uh, more or less, more or less, like race. Could, could you talk a little bit about how that could work? 

[00:32:29] Khaled Beydoun: Yeah. One, one of my first rations with a, a lot of the existing scholarship on surveillance.

Or fixate? Fixate specifically on race. And in this, in, in, in my work, uh, you know, I want to expand and talk about Saul and Id as well, of which race is one form of Sault and identity. Mm-hmm. . But in some countries, like Uganda for instance, the state has deployed surveillance as a way to crack down on sexual minorities.

Mm-hmm. Right? To be, to be queer, lesbian, or gay or trans. In a place like Uganda, that subaltern identity is the [00:33:00] fixation. Surveillance weaponry in that state. In a place like Egypt, for instance, Muslim majority country, where the current regime is cracking down in the Muslim Brotherhood, you have a Muslim majority state partaking in Islamophobia.

Mm-hmm. , surprisingly enough. Mm-hmm. and using. surveillance tools to crack down on the sub altered identity of religion. Mm-hmm. , that's also the case in, it's also the case in China where religion is the primary subaltern identity that surveillance is cracking down on. In some states it could be gender.

Mm-hmm. , Right. In some states it could be political affiliation. Yeah. Uh, if a specific state, for instance, you like Brazil is suspicious of socialist elements. Right. The subaltern identity could be social. Um, in places like Latin American countries, it could be gang affiliation or perceived gang affiliation.

So it's important for us to think about sub altar and vulnerable, vulnerable identities beyond race. And that's where my work is, is, is pushing people to think more broadly about. But race is important. But yeah, it's one [00:34:00] of many factors, uh, of vulnerability. Now, 

[00:34:03] Kyle Langvardt: when you talk about the subjugation, Society, you stress the fact.

There's a state actor, a a, a state actor who is pushing along this kind of, uh, flywheel of self, self censorship, pri- private surveillance. The, the state's kind of go this entire thing on, but is the state a necessary ingredient do you think, to, to the society of subjugation, or could you imagine a scenario where large private companies come to to play the same role?

[00:34:40] Khaled Beydoun: So a lot of it depends on context, right? So what's what's distinct about China is that it's an authoritarian structure where the state is collaborating very closely and symbiotically with big tech corporations in those countries to still maintain a robust rule. And that's [00:35:00] what distinguishes the subjugation society from the control society, right?

Because in the control society theoretically, To lose. The philosopher who introduces that concept says that it's no longer the state is that that is the primary purveyor of surveillance. It's the corporation, it's Facebook, it's Twitter. Mm-hmm. . And that's what Sja Zubo talks about in surveillance capitalism, right?

Mm-hmm. that we've shifted from the state being the principal purveyor of surveillance towards the big corporation. So we're, we're seeing in the United States and other quote unquote democratic societies where the know-how. The, the financial and political hegemony of these big tech corporations like Amazon, Twitter, Facebook, Google, and so forth and so on, are almost usurping the capacity of the state to engage in surveillance because of their, their prowess, right?

Mm-hmm. . So that possibility I think is very foreseeable in a, a [00:36:00] place like the United States. One question I'm often asked is, can, can the prospect of total surveillance or the sub subjugation society come to pass or come to be in the United States? I'm not sure. Right. But I, I think we're already seeing parallels or symptoms of it here in the United States, especially when the targets of the surveillance are members of a vulnerable community.

Mm-hmm. . Right. We see this ensemble of violence, for instance, against black activists or members of the Muslim community who are tied to terrorism. So, yeah, I mean, I, I, I think that we're living at this crossroads where the power of these huge, you know, big tech corporations, short of some form of strident and robust regulation, I think on the horizon would see them surpass.

The government is being the principle, uh, 

[00:36:52] Kyle Langvardt: catalyst of surveillance. Is there something about information technology that you, you think just naturally nudges [00:37:00] things in that direction? You know, one, one thing that I always think of when I think of. Social media is this image of kind of like a, a spreadsheet, uh, where you're trying to categorize people as cleanly as possible mm-hmm.

for, for various types of, of purposes. And obviously you can, you can see parallels there with race and, and all kinds of identity formation. Mm-hmm. , you could sometimes, I, I wonder about scenarios where people use, uh, augmented reality to pull. Information about people they, they see on the street. And you could almost imagine, uh, a, a, a situation where there are aspects of a person's profile that, that begin to form a basis for, for discrimination.

Do I mean, do, do you think that that's, that, that's right. That information technology maybe inherently inclines us in this direction. Or do you think that maybe there's a more, a more hopeful scenario where maybe the state could, could [00:38:00] use some of these techniques to push against the creeping tendency toward the surveillance society?

Is, is there a situation where private enterprise could do that well, Right. 

[00:38:10] Khaled Beydoun: So like pitti pitting the state against private enterprise. Orients to frightening objectives against one another. Right. So on one hand we're juxtaposing the state objective of policing and surveillance. That's the primary objective the state has always had in collecting information.

Right. You know, aside from census data research, but the principle objective of data collection for the state is, is policing. Mm-hmm. in control. On the other hand, with, with, with, with corporations, it's maximizing. Profit. Right. And those are two sort of, I guess not people interested aims that I take issue with, but I think.

To preface that is to say that algorithms don't write themselves, right? Yeah. And I think that we're living in, uh, you know, a world and where, whether [00:39:00] it's the state or these big corporations that the individuals writing these algorithms tend to be from one narrow demographic, Right? It's largely, it's largely white folks, right?

Who are writing about minorities. So one, one hopeful step that I'd like to see, and I mean beyond just sort of like token representation, is to have members of over over police groups become, Part of this collective of algorithm authors that can, or whether it's, you know, entities, third parties that serve as buffers between how these, these algorithms are written and produced that can kind of identify the bias or potentially discriminatory patterns of algorithms to safeguard members of vulnerable minorities or populations.

From not bearing the brunt of the destructive effects of data collection. Yeah. 

[00:39:49] Kyle Langvardt: Well, let's, let's hope we see some developments along those lines. ? Yeah. Wow. 

[00:39:56] Khaled Beydoun: I think we're seeing some of it, right? I think at least, I think big tech [00:40:00] companies are at least paying lips, lip service to being more diverse and inclusive.

You know, whether that's superficial or genuine. Yeah. I think. Still up for debate, but it's better than that. Not existing at all. Yeah, 

[00:40:13] Kyle Langvardt: I, I, no, I think, uh, I I sometimes think that, uh, superficiality and hypocrisy can be underrated virtues, and I, and I mean, and I, I mean that, I mean that, that, seriously, I mean, I, I think that.

Well, one way to think 

[00:40:28] Khaled Beydoun: about it, right, if they open the door, that it might be up to folks from these communities to kick it 

[00:40:32] Kyle Langvardt: open, right? Yeah. I mean the, the, well, yeah, ab absolutely. If, if somebody feels that they're under the obligation to appear to be doing the right thing, there are opportunities that, um, That, that open maybe for, for other, other people to open that commitment up a little wider.

And who knows, maybe even in, in the best scenarios, it has some kind of formative influence on these institutions themselves. Yeah. 

[00:40:55] Khaled Beydoun: And you could change the culture of these institutions with. [00:41:00] Uh, members of historically for, you know, foreclosed groups, you know, rising the leadership positions, being able to curate the, the cultures of a Facebook mm-hmm.

or Google. So, you know, the, the optimist in me like, makes me want to believe that. But there's always that internal pessimist in me that knows, you know, the racial history of this country. How, you know, precedent technologies, a function that make me guarded. Well, you know, 

[00:41:23] Kyle Langvardt: one, one theory about. Brown versus board, and, and people don't usually think of this as a, a kind of hopeful theory from the, uh, the perspective of racial equity was that Brown versus board had a lot to do with public imaging for, for the United States.

And, uh, that this was an attempt to, uh, respond to, to criticism from the Soviet Union. Who knows, maybe there's a, a, a kind of hopeful scenario where, uh, the, the United States for purposes of. Image on the international stage says we, we don't wanna walk any further down the [00:42:00] road to Jin Jong. And, and so we're going to institute some, some real reforms.

Uh, may, maybe that would be one particularly hopeful outcome. Yeah, and I think that's a great 

[00:42:09] Khaled Beydoun: way to close and bring this conversation together is you've just cited Derek Bell, right? Mm-hmm. , he's a pioneering critical race theorist. Introducing this idea of interest convergence and maybe China's rise to compete with the United States in these new digital technological.

Wars on the global stage, um, you know, might push the United States merely out of geopolitical imperative to appear more diverse and inclusive as China and the United States compete for influence, specifically with majority non-white countries, right? Mm-hmm. , in order for it to go to like these African countries, middle Eastern countries, Latinx countries, and so forth and so on, it cannot appear to be.

Or racist and exclusive when competing against China. So maybe you can wield racial inclusion and multiculturalism as an expedient to compete against China on the global stage. 

[00:42:58] Kyle Langvardt: I'll take it. [00:43:00] Well, uh, this has been, this has been a great, great discussion and so I want to, I wanna thank you for joining us today.

I've been your host today. My name's Kyle Langvardt. Thank you for joining us on this episode of Tech Refactored. If you wanna learn more about what we're doing here at NGTC or submit an idea for a future episode, you can go to our website at ngtc.unl.edu. That's nctc.unl.edu. Or you can follow us on Twitter at UNL underscore NGTC.

And if you enjoyed the show, o only if you enjoyed the show, Don't forget to leave us a rating and review wherever you listen to podcasts. Our show is produced by Elsbeth Magilton and Lysandra Marquez and Colin McCarthy. Created and recorded our theme music. This podcast is part of the Menard Governance and Technology Programming series.

And until next time. Be good to yourself and do be good to each other.[00:44:00]