Accepting PhD Students

PhD projects

https://supervisorconnect.it.monash.edu/projects/research/social-political-economic-studies-technology-and-fire-finance-insurance-real

20112025

Research activity per year

Personal profile

Biography

I study the political economy of information technology. I’m a Senior Research Fellow in the Emerging Technologies Research Lab // Department of Human Centred-Computing // Faculty of Information Technology // Monash University // Melbourne, Australia. I’m also an Associate Investigator with the ARC Centre of Excellence for Automated Decision-Making & Society.

Currently, my work is funded by a DECRA fellowship from the Australian Research Council for a project researching the market for insurance technology, the regime of actuarial governance, and the impacts of this risky business for all of us. See my recent journal article — Total Life Insurance: Logics of Anticipatory Control and Actuarial Governance in Insurance Technology — for an overview of the framework and agenda that motivates my research.

My first book — Too Smart: How Digital Capitalism is Extracting Data, Controlling Our Lives, and Taking Over the World — lays out how the pursuit of power and profit is being materialized through smart technologies that have infiltrated all of society. My second book — The Mechanic and the Luddite: A Ruthless Criticism of Technology and Capitalism — goes even deeper into demystifying the material relations that underlie these systems and showing why technological capitalism must be dismantled so we can build a better world, bit by bit. These two books are best paired together.

In addition to publishing work in a range of academic journals, I also regularly write and speak about the politics of technology in many major media outlets. All of that can be found on my CV

I also co-host a weekly podcast on technology and political economy: This Machine Kills. You can listen and subscribe anywhere fine podcasts are distributed. 

Expertise related to UN Sustainable Development Goals

In 2015, UN member states agreed to 17 global Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to end poverty, protect the planet and ensure prosperity for all. This person’s work contributes towards the following SDG(s):

  • SDG 3 - Good Health and Well-being
  • SDG 5 - Gender Equality
  • SDG 7 - Affordable and Clean Energy
  • SDG 10 - Reduced Inequalities
  • SDG 11 - Sustainable Cities and Communities
  • SDG 12 - Responsible Consumption and Production
  • SDG 13 - Climate Action

Education/Academic qualification

Human and Social Dimensions of Science and Technology, Doctor of Philosophy, Arizona State University

Award Date: 9 Aug 2016

Research area keywords

  • smart technology
  • digital technology
  • automation
  • data and society
  • political economy
  • inequality
  • urban geography
  • social theory

Collaborations and top research areas from the last five years

Recent external collaboration on country/territory level. Dive into details by clicking on the dots or