The SODAS Lab combines innovative data access, processing and analysis techniques in research and teaching. Digitalisation generates new forms of data and sources for social processes. Statistical software such as R offers a wide range of analysis options. Sociology can take up these developments as social data science by providing a sociological foundation for innovative data science and reflecting on the social consequences of increasing digitalisation. The lab brings together various strands of research, including projects with process-produced data and digital platforms. The main focus is on data quality, linking digital data with social science theories, geodata and automated text analysis. These are combined with established methods and critical perspectives, including qualitative case studies and digital mixed methods. The lab integrates research and teaching in the chair to familiarise students with data access and analysis at an early stage. For example, new approaches such as AI-based transcription and coding are taught.
Habilitation projects
Intrinsic logic and social influence of the software field(Dr. Dzifa Ametowobla)
As part of my habilitation, I am investigating the organizational field of software production and the influence it exerts on relationship and meaning structures in other organizational fields. The starting point is the observation that, in the course of digital transformation, practices (e.g. agile working) and organizational forms (e.g. platform organizations) that have long been typical of the software field are spreading into ever new areas of society. In order to understand this dynamic, I would like to find out ...
- ... how and why elements of an inherent logic of the software field, which have developed in the course of the conflict over specific coordination problems there, can spread to other fields with completely different coordination problems
- ... what role the structures of the software used in the fields of application to process field-specific tasks play in these developments and
- ... to what extent this changes the overall social power position of the software field
Meaningful Work and Moral Economy(Dr. Knut Laaser)
Over the past three years, Knut Laaser has been working with Sharon C. Bolton and later with Jan Ch. Karlsson on a theory of 'Meaningful Work' that overcomes the dualism of 'Meaningful-Meaningless Work' on the one hand and the dichotomy of objective and subjective dimensions of Meaningful Work on the other. Based on social-theoretical and social-philosophical theories (Archer, Bhaskar, Honneth, Marx), the 'Meaningful-Meaningless' Work approach forms a sociological theory of meaningful-meaningless wage labor, which is based on three objective and subjective dimensions of autonomy, recognition and dignity. The work analyzes the interplay of these dimensions in different jobs and employment relationships and develops 'meaningful work' - 'meaningless work' scenarios. Another focus is the theoretical development and application of a 'moral economy' approach, which brings together political economy, sociological and normative theories. Empirical research articles analyzing the marketization of work and counter-strategies of workers complete this research topic. Currently, Knut is editor of a special issue in 'Economic and Industrial Democracy' on 'Moral Economy at the Crossroads'. Together with international researchers, he is working on the marketization and digitalization of psychotherapeutic services and the 'Uberization of Therapy'.
Gender and labour relations in the coal phase-out in Lusatia(Dr. Virginia Kimey Pflücke)
I am working on my habilitation on gender and labor relations in the coal phase-out in Lusatia. The central question is how the socio-ecological transformation of Lusatia from coal-centered extractivism to a post-fossil region is being shaped, and how this energy transition is shaped by an ongoing political, economic and cultural industrialism. This includes the analysis of the models of post-industrial policies and the gendered labor relations in coal mining and the regional labor market. For my research, I use a combination of qualitative and quantitative analyses of interests (stakeholder and network analysis) and visions (qualitative interviews and discourse analysis), as well as labor market, demographic and economic data (quantitative analysis). Through the framing of a feminist sociology, I show the interplay of extractivist legacies and gender dynamics in the transformation of the post-socialist region.