Biologia

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How the analysis of Free/Open Software might benefit of Actor-Network Theory
Alexander Pereira García STS Master Universidad Nacional de Colombia

Assumptions of economic and social development, that suggests the scientific knowledge, in the context of modern Western society, argue that the developing countries, understood in this logic, have a low level in technology and innovation that,of course, limits their development and perpetuates the inequality gaps compared to other regions. In the context of information society is understood that some technological devices, such as free/open software, are strategic to overcome those gaps. This understanding suggests high points of discussion, which have already had some academic career. Issues such as the problem of property rightsraises discussions about the alleged benefits of using open source technologies with respect to the private license-based models, which have a hegemonic and monopolistic character, in corporations as Microsoft. Furthermore, the debate is an extremely ideological claim about excluded groups and their access to knowledge. In this regard various free software groups understand themselves as promoting aform of democratization of knowledge and access to technology. A look at these debates is possible from a deep sociological analysis to establish the complexities of the relationships within the Free/Open Source Software (FOSS) communities, including programmers, hackers, users, activists and other characters involved in promotion, use and appropriation of FOSS but also the mechanisms that permitthe social construction of that technology, including technical and institutional devices involved in the process. One of the most problematic issue in this regard is the definition itself of free software because, in some ways, this concept is naturalized by many actors. Software, like other technologies, embodies specific relations of power, so that their production and use are associated withparticular understandings, whether ideological or otherwise, by various actors, being a form of resistance. Free software has been implemented and promoted by the participation of various actors: the free software communities, academics, private enterprise, and even political parties. But not only in Latin America, or in the regions of the periphery, free software is listed as technological option,but in Europe and North America

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discussions on free software, or at least on the adoption of technological solutions based in open source have come to the governments of various countries. Assumptions about free software are, first, a comprehensive framework for research. One way of approaching, the dynamic and problematic situations about free software as sociotechnical device is in theActor Network Theory as a key to interpretation. This theoretical development allows to reflect on the dialogue between technology and social contexts. But rather than talk about "dialogue", which proposes a differentiation between the two contexts, the ActorNetwork Theory allows is precisely locate them on the same level, according to the principle of symmetry proposed by the Strong Program. Thesoftware is the heart of the development of information technologies and communication (ICTs), but to address the interactions between innovation, technology and society, usually placed it in different domains (Lin, 2004: 11), however, from perspectives as the ANT this perspective must be reviewed. ANT theory gives relevance to the networks and interactions that are established in the processesof knowledge production and generated a link between human actors and non-humans in this process. For discussions on software, other aspects, apart from the individuals themselves, appears with relevant in the process of imposition, or reivindication, of certain technological proposals, as stated in Law (1992), knowledge "may be seen as a product or an effect of a network of heterogeneous...