Introducing Resistance GIS

Are you interested in using or do you already use Geographic Information Systems (GIS) or geospatial technologies to help the world?  Do you oppose the exploitation of these technologies for applications of war, surveillance, marketing, and unsustainable resource extraction?  Do you want to know how to apply your knowledge to support social movements?

What is Resistance GIS?

Resistance GIS is a free mini-conference taking place on May 20th, 2017 at Portland State University.

This conference aims to build a new critically informed framework for applications of GIS by providing a space for GIS experts and non-experts to exchange radical ideas that challenge the dominant paradigm of GIS as neutral tool.  Students, academics, organizers, professionals, and the general public are welcome to join, learn and share tips, skills, and visions for how geospatial technologies, open data, and data visualization can empower communities and support civil resistance struggles and social movements.

Why Resistance GIS?

GIS are ubiquitous. They have helped our world with efficiency, saving money, making better decisions, communication, and visualizing our complex lives.  Perhaps expectedly, applications of these powerful advancements have most significantly benefited government agencies and large corporations.  And while many results of their institutional applications have led to great advancements in the way humans live and interact with the world around them, many others have enabled unbridled capitalism, invasive marketing, resource exploitation, culling, surveillance and war.

But as geospatial technologies become cheaper and more publicly accessible, control of the spatial narrative is shifting.  Resistance GIS is a forum to explore this shift and develop a framework for how GIS can be used a tool of empowerment for community organizations and social movements.