The Challenge of Representing a Sociotechnical System: Fair Tracing and the Value Chain

Light, A. (2008) The Challenge of Representing a Sociotechnical System: Fair Tracing and the Value Chain, Workshop on Sociotechnical Aspects of Interaction Design, London, May 2008

The Fair Tracing project has as its heart the representation of a sociotechnical system, with its emphasis on the social, economic and environmental aspects of food production as a means of profitably connecting Fair Trade producers in developing countries with ethical consumers in the North. The political elements of the production system will be displayed as part of telling the story of the value chain. The case study is interesting in that not only have we set out to explore and understand the value chain and the information flows accompanying it, but the findings will inform two aspects of the project: first, the design of the system and what use would be reasonable to expect of busy people; second, the representation at the interface that users see when they choose to learn more about the circumstances of production. A significant challenge will be representing the politics of production relationships in the design of the Fair Tracing system in such a way that the tool remains agnostic, but the power relations can be understood – and even challenged.