Project Society Funded Projects
- How can and should privacy concerns be addressed in automated systems with respect to law?
- How can we advise lawmakers and policymakers about risks and ethical considerations of UAVs and the type of data they gather?
- What factors affect how the public views UAVs?
- What are some of the unintended consequences of UAV deployment and what can be done to address them (e.g. interference with firefighting efforts)?
These are examples of questions that are addressed by Project Society. With high level of interest in the use of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV) for research, government, and commercial purposes, the public desires thorough leadership regarding the political and ethical implications.
Project Society is a collaborative multidisciplinary environment on the CU Boulder campus. It will be a national model for organizing and further developing expertise in the social sciences, humanities, and law for understanding the social, ethical, political and cultural implications of the rapidly growing use of UAVs. The project is aimed at producing both practical outcomes (e.g. policy and legal advice) and theoretical advances (and potentially artistic or literary production) in this area. Unlike other efforts that focus only on the technical aspects of unmanned aerial systems, this project enhances CU’s Grand Challenge by bringing expertise from the social sciences, humanities, and law to complement engineering and the biophysical sciences.
Concretely, the first phase of this project will (1) create opportunities for faculty research on topics related to the socio-political dimensions of UAVs, (2) hold workshops or symposia, and (3) bring speakers to campus to highlight and grow the scholarly community working on all social aspects of UAVs. In the longer term, we expect this to lead to larger grant proposals as well as publications.
Project Society Resources
Primary Contacts
Lorraine M. Bayard de Volo (Co-leader), Associate Professor and Chair, Women and Gender Studies | lbdv@colorado.edu | 303-492-3206
Emily T. Yeh (Co-leader), Professor and Chair, Department of Geography | emily.yeh@colorado.edu | 303-492-8310