Civil Data Disobedience: Navigating Data Interaction Challenges in Human Rights Defense Organizations

Paper Title

Civil Data Disobedience: Navigating Data Interaction Challenges in Human Rights Defense Organizations

Publication Info

• Topic area: Data practices and challenges in human rights defense organizations.
• Keywords: Human rights, data literacy, GDPR, data feminism, critical data literacy, NGOs, data protection, marginalized communities, data refusal, HCI.

Background and Problem

• Problem / challenge: Human rights defender organizations face significant challenges in managing data securely and effectively due to limited resources, risks of surveillance, and regulatory constraints like GDPR. These issues are compounded by the need to protect vulnerable individuals and maintain organizational legitimacy.
• Significance: Understanding how these organizations navigate data practices is critical for improving their ability to support marginalized communities while ensuring safety and compliance with legal frameworks.
• Motivation and related work: Prior research highlights the centrality of data in nonprofit advocacy but notes mismatches between organizational needs and resources. Existing studies have not sufficiently explored how human rights defender organizations in welfare states like Sweden address these challenges, leaving a gap this paper seeks to fill.

Solution

• Proposed approach: The study investigates how human rights defender organizations in Sweden interact with data, focusing on avoidance, regulatory transgressions, and data use for advocacy. It employs a theoretical framework combining data feminism and critical data literacy.
• Novelty:
  1. Identifies three modes of data interaction: avoidance, regulatory transgressions, and data as a resource.
  2. Demonstrates how data practices are forms of care, refusal, and situated expertise.
  3. Highlights the paradoxes of GDPR and its impact on marginalized groups.
  4. Advocates for designing inclusive data infrastructures sensitive to vulnerability and pluralism.
• Procedure and key techniques:
  • Conducted a qualitative study of seven Swedish human rights defender organizations.
  • Analyzed interviews with eight participants and observed social media activities.
  • Used reflexive thematic analysis to identify patterns in data practices.
  • Integrated feminist and critical data literacy theories to interpret findings.

Results

• Concrete findings:
  • Organizations avoid digital data collection to protect individuals, often relying on paper-based systems.
  • Regulatory frameworks like GDPR sometimes hinder immediate humanitarian support, requiring organizations to transgress rules.
  • Data is essential for advocacy, reporting, and securing funding, but its use must be carefully managed to avoid risks.
• Advantage over baselines: Highlights the nuanced, context-specific strategies organizations employ to navigate data challenges, going beyond technical or compliance-focused approaches.
• Experiments / evaluation:
  • Case study of seven organizations with diverse focuses (e.g., LGBTIQA+, women's shelters, homelessness, refugee support).
  • Semi-structured interviews and social media observations provided qualitative insights.
  • Reflexive thematic analysis ensured a rich, collaborative interpretation of data.
• Limitations and future work:
  • Limited to Swedish organizations; findings may not generalize globally.
  • Did not include interviews with the marginalized groups directly supported by the organizations.
  • Future work should explore designing flexible and inclusive data infrastructures and policies.

Summary

This paper examines how human rights defender organizations in Sweden navigate data practices amidst resource constraints, regulatory challenges, and the need to protect vulnerable individuals. It identifies three modes of data interaction—avoidance, regulatory transgressions, and data use for advocacy—and interprets these practices through the lenses of data feminism and critical data literacy. The findings highlight the political and ethical dimensions of data practices, showing how organizations balance care, safety, and compliance. The study contributes to HCI by emphasizing the need for inclusive, flexible data infrastructures that support both digital and analogue practices while addressing the vulnerabilities of marginalized groups.