Social memory infrastructures: pushing the boundaries of information infrastructures to memorialize, raise awareness and advocate for justice
Allan A. Martell, Fatima Espinoza VasquezPurpose
In this article, we adopt an infrastructural approach to explore the role of information infrastructures in shaping social memory in a post-conflict context. We aim to extend prior research about the role of cultural heritage institutions as social infrastructures, showcasing these institutions' role within the larger grid of information infrastructures at a social remove.
Design/methodology/approach
Adopting a grounded theory approach and drawing from interviews and primary sources, we trace the emergence of an information infrastructure in post-war El Salvador (1992–2019). Two questions were explored: (1) What are the traits of memory-oriented information infrastructures? (2) How do memory activists adapt these infrastructures to meet their goals of memorialization, accountability and social change? To answer these, we build on the overlapping frameworks of information activism and memory activism.
Findings
We argue that cultural heritage institutions can serve as key nodes within the broader framework of an information infrastructure, enabling information activists to challenge information opacity and offer support to victims of human rights violations.
Research limitations/implications
We analyzed the macro level of an information infrastructure using secondary data, and thus, we cannot speak to the motivations, beliefs and attitudes of policy-makers. Thus, we cannot ascertain whether the impacts of the analyzed policies reflect the intentions of policy-makers. Furthermore, while it is publicly known that victims' associations in our context participated in the domestic and international lawsuits against the amnesty and the State, we did not ask whether our participants were personally involved. Thus, we cannot speak to their motivations, beliefs and attitudes at the macro-level.
Practical implications
Our case study demonstrates that information activism can reshape existing information infrastructures in a post-conflict context. Future work should explore the reshaping of information infrastructures in electoral autocracies, given the global trend towards this form of governance.
Originality/value
Our results extend ongoing conversations about how specific cultural heritage institutions function as social infrastructures, how activist work can realign information infrastructures toward the pursuit of justice, how these realigned infrastructures bear a positive affective impact on victims, and how cultural heritage institutions can serve as counter-power structures and the affective role of information in post-conflict contexts.