Differential Disruption and Human Flourishing: Towards a Capability-Based Approach for Assessing Socially Disruptive Technologies

While the concept of differential disruption has attracted growing attention in the ethics of technology, its normative dimensions remain underexplored. Current literature primarily uses differential disruption as a descriptive concept to highlight how Socially Disruptive Technologies (SDTs) impact diversely situated groups differentially, but rarely interrogates how these technologies (re)produce or exacerbate social inequalities. Building on recent calls to bring to the fore the normative potential of differential disruption, this paper argues that assessments of SDTs must move beyond discussions on epistemic injustice alone, and consider how epistemic injustices are deeply entangled with concerns of wellbeing and human flourishing. The paper shows that SDT development and assessment practices often rely on generalised assumptions about wellbeing, and thereby risk excluding marginalised modes of flourishing. Consequently, it argues that the ethics of SDTs requires a heterogeneous and context-sensitive evaluative framework. To this end, the paper argues for a capability-based approach to the ethical assessment of SDTs. By centring what people are actually able to be and do, as well as attending to people’s diverse capacities to convert SDTs into genuine opportunities to flourish, a capability-based framework equips ethicists of technology with the conceptual tools to critically assess when, how, and for whom SDTs generate harms, while being sensitive to heterogeneous interpretations and experiences of flourishing.