Sensoring the Oceans: The Argo Floats Array in the Governance of Science Data Infrastructures

Forthcoming in Fleur Johns, Gavin Sullivan & Dimitri Van Den Meerssche (eds), Global Governance by Data: Infrastructures of Algorithmic Rule (Cambridge University Press)

35 Pages Posted: 17 Dec 2024 Last revised: 16 Dec 2024

See all articles by Angelina Fisher

Angelina Fisher

New York University School of Law

Benedict Kingsbury

New York University School of Law

Thomas Streinz

European University Institute - Department of Law (LAW); European University Institute - Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies (RSCAS); NYU School of Law - Guarini Global Law & Tech

Date Written: September 01, 2024

Abstract

What role do governance arrangements, background legal rules, and the core infrastructures play in enabling data collection, determining what “ocean data” is produced, and when and how it is made available? We explore this question by focusing on data about oceanic features produced by Argo – an international program, operationalized by state agencies and research institutions, that comprises arrays of autonomous floats for ocean observation. Through examination of annual meeting notes, interviews, and observation of the Argo Steering Committee’s annual meeting, we analyze the techniques and practices involved in planning, testing, calibrating, validating, and error-correcting that ultimately lead to the production, transmission, and dissemination of Argo data. We then position Argo within the institutional governance of oceans, weather, climate and, most recently, earth systems to illustrate both the evolution of Argo’s role and its evolving and uneasy position within different governance approaches. In the conclusion, we challenge the utility of “ocean data” as an analytical category and highlight the risks of over-coordination and institutionalization of data infrastructures. We suggest that allowing data infrastructures like Argo to develop organically might lead to productive (if unexpected) connections, fusions, or splits, which might in turn reorient the focus of observation towards unexplored interactions between and within earth systems. We hope that our analysis helps bring to the fore some core data-infrastructural features of planetary governance as it now exists and will (have to) rapidly further evolve.

Keywords: data governance, ocean data, data infrastructure, thinking infrastructurally, Argo, planetary governance, scientific data

Suggested Citation

Fisher, Angelina and Kingsbury, Benedict and Streinz, Thomas, Sensoring the Oceans: The Argo Floats Array in the Governance of Science Data Infrastructures (September 01, 2024). Forthcoming in Fleur Johns, Gavin Sullivan & Dimitri Van Den Meerssche (eds), Global Governance by Data: Infrastructures of Algorithmic Rule (Cambridge University Press), Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=5055008 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.5055008

Angelina Fisher (Contact Author)

New York University School of Law ( email )

40 Washington Square South
New York, NY 10012-1099
United States

HOME PAGE: http://www.guariniglobal,org

Benedict Kingsbury

New York University School of Law ( email )

40 Washington Square South
New York, NY 10012-1099
United States
212-998-6278 (Phone)

HOME PAGE: http://rb.gy/y1pz91

Thomas Streinz

European University Institute - Department of Law (LAW) ( email )

Via Bolognese 156 (Villa Salviati)
50-139 Firenze
ITALY

European University Institute - Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies (RSCAS) ( email )

Villa Schifanoia
Via Boccacio 121
Florence, Florence 50139
Italy

NYU School of Law - Guarini Global Law & Tech ( email )

40 Washington Square South
New York, NY 10012-1099
United States

HOME PAGE: http://www.guariniglobal.org

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