“Not on my watch!” : a case study in the datafication of child welfare in Aotearoa New Zealand : a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Philosophy in Social Work at Massey University, Manawatū, New Zealand
Loading...
Date
2021
DOI
Open Access Location
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Massey University
Rights
The Author
Abstract
This thesis is a case study of a policy and technological innovation in the New Zealand child protection system. It explores policy proposals associated with the White Paper for Vulnerable Children. In particular, it examines plans to create a digital information system called the Vulnerable Kids’ Information System. Proposals for this new information system included plans to test and trial a ground-breaking predictive risk modelling tool based on an algorithm that would generate a risk score for all newborn children in New Zealand, a risk score that would be used to target interventions to prevent harm before it occurred. Data for this study was obtained from interviews with four elite informants who were members of two panels advising government on the Green Paper for Vulnerable Children (the Frontline Panel & the Scientific Panel), and from an analysis of a sample of ten news media reports associated
with the news media controversy about these developments. Drawing on the Foucauldian analytical framework of governmentality, and concepts from actor-network theory, the study explores how the policy issue of vulnerable children was problematised and how this problematisation was connected to the political rationality of social investment. It also traces how policy actors – including ministers, technical
experts, ethicists, academics and others – used rhetorical interventions to frame the issue. In spite of the fact that the study intended to trace the development of the Vulnerable Kids’ Information System, in the end it was the rise and eventual demise of a predictive risk modelling tool that dominated the data.