Communicative strategies for building public confidence in data governance: Analyzing Singapore's COVID-19 contact-tracing initiatives
Effective social data governance rests on a bedrock of social support. Without securing trust from the populace whose information is being collected, analyzed, and deployed, policies on which such data are based will be undermined by a lack of public confidence. The COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated...
| Main Authors: | , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
SAGE Publishing
2022-01-01
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| Series: | Big Data & Society |
| Online Access: | https://doi.org/10.1177/20539517221104086 |
| _version_ | 1811342882256191488 |
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| author | Gordon Kuo Siong Tan Sun Sun Lim |
| author_facet | Gordon Kuo Siong Tan Sun Sun Lim |
| author_sort | Gordon Kuo Siong Tan |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Effective social data governance rests on a bedrock of social support. Without securing trust from the populace whose information is being collected, analyzed, and deployed, policies on which such data are based will be undermined by a lack of public confidence. The COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated digitalization and datafication by governments for the purposes of contact tracing and epidemiological investigation. However, concerns about surveillance and data privacy have stunted the adoption of such contact-tracing initiatives. This commentary analyzes Singapore's contact-tracing initiative to uncover the reasons for public resistance and efforts by the state to address them. The government's contact-tracing program encompassing its proprietary TraceTogether app and physical token initially triggered vociferous public criticisms of Big Brother style surveillance. Using a dialogic communication framework, we analyze the TraceTogether initiative to interrogate the communicative strategies that were used to overcome public resistance. We argue that these strategies reflect a top-down approach that prioritizes transactional dissemination of information, in line with Singapore's technocratic stance toward governance. We further assert that such communicative tactics represent missed opportunities to foster public confidence in social data governance through greater trust building. We propose solutions for more dialogic communicative forms that build trust, so that officials can develop a sound understanding of the public concerns, increase the level of public engagement, and incorporate public feedback into policies that govern data use. |
| first_indexed | 2024-04-13T19:19:49Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-2c4cfead14ca44a797b37bbebcf6d2de |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 2053-9517 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-04-13T19:19:49Z |
| publishDate | 2022-01-01 |
| publisher | SAGE Publishing |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Big Data & Society |
| spelling | doaj.art-2c4cfead14ca44a797b37bbebcf6d2de2022-12-22T02:33:34ZengSAGE PublishingBig Data & Society2053-95172022-01-01910.1177/20539517221104086Communicative strategies for building public confidence in data governance: Analyzing Singapore's COVID-19 contact-tracing initiativesGordon Kuo Siong TanSun Sun LimEffective social data governance rests on a bedrock of social support. Without securing trust from the populace whose information is being collected, analyzed, and deployed, policies on which such data are based will be undermined by a lack of public confidence. The COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated digitalization and datafication by governments for the purposes of contact tracing and epidemiological investigation. However, concerns about surveillance and data privacy have stunted the adoption of such contact-tracing initiatives. This commentary analyzes Singapore's contact-tracing initiative to uncover the reasons for public resistance and efforts by the state to address them. The government's contact-tracing program encompassing its proprietary TraceTogether app and physical token initially triggered vociferous public criticisms of Big Brother style surveillance. Using a dialogic communication framework, we analyze the TraceTogether initiative to interrogate the communicative strategies that were used to overcome public resistance. We argue that these strategies reflect a top-down approach that prioritizes transactional dissemination of information, in line with Singapore's technocratic stance toward governance. We further assert that such communicative tactics represent missed opportunities to foster public confidence in social data governance through greater trust building. We propose solutions for more dialogic communicative forms that build trust, so that officials can develop a sound understanding of the public concerns, increase the level of public engagement, and incorporate public feedback into policies that govern data use.https://doi.org/10.1177/20539517221104086 |
| spellingShingle | Gordon Kuo Siong Tan Sun Sun Lim Communicative strategies for building public confidence in data governance: Analyzing Singapore's COVID-19 contact-tracing initiatives Big Data & Society |
| title | Communicative strategies for building public confidence in data governance: Analyzing Singapore's COVID-19 contact-tracing initiatives |
| title_full | Communicative strategies for building public confidence in data governance: Analyzing Singapore's COVID-19 contact-tracing initiatives |
| title_fullStr | Communicative strategies for building public confidence in data governance: Analyzing Singapore's COVID-19 contact-tracing initiatives |
| title_full_unstemmed | Communicative strategies for building public confidence in data governance: Analyzing Singapore's COVID-19 contact-tracing initiatives |
| title_short | Communicative strategies for building public confidence in data governance: Analyzing Singapore's COVID-19 contact-tracing initiatives |
| title_sort | communicative strategies for building public confidence in data governance analyzing singapore s covid 19 contact tracing initiatives |
| url | https://doi.org/10.1177/20539517221104086 |
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