Municipalities Enacting Algorithms: A Typology of Dutch Municipal Strategies for Leveraging Algorithmic Systems

Abstract

Increasingly, the public sector and governments are algorithmizing. Inherently, the algorithms they use are sociotechnical in nature. More concretely, algorithms are done or rather: ‘enacted’. Similar or technically identical systems can be enacted differently by another organization which can completely shift the legal, ethical and social implications of their use. If academic efforts of providing legally, ethically, and socially acceptable ways of doing algorithms are to succeed, we urgently need to understand how algorithmic systems are enacted in practice. This contribution presents an analysis of municipal algorithmic practices in Dutch municipalities, based on a wide variety of ‘scavenged’ material such as fieldnotes, interviews, and documents and a four-year long engagement with the Dutch municipal scene. Departing from this analysis, the typology of different municipal enactment strategies is synthesized. Four archetypes are introduced: frontrunners, fast fashionistas, conscientious cat-observers, and slowpokes. These archetypes enact algorithms in different ways and with varying goals. Each of these archetypes has benefits and drawbacks, and recommendations are highly situational. However, for municipalities just setting out to grapple with this theme, a conscientious cat-observer strategy is potentially more compatible with current public and political demands around responsible and accountable algorithm use.