AI and Technology Refusal

Type:

Research

Date Range:

2026

– Ongoing

Marcin Wilkowski / https://betterimagesofai.org / https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Project Summary

An investigation of individual, collective, community, and legal methods, motivations, and mechanisms for refusing technology. This interdisciplinary study combines various methods for examining data that comes from social media, court filings, and surveys, and examines the discourse, frames, and potential for collective action

Key Findings

①

Diverse Methods of Refusal Across Scales. Technology and AI refusal manifests at multiple operational levels, ranging from personal decisions (individual) to coordinated resistance (collective/community) and formal institutional challenges (legal).

②

Multi-Source Empirical Evidence. Disconnect and resistance strategies are grounded in real-world data across distinct domains, analyzing discourse, motivations, and action frameworks through social media, legal court filings, and user surveys.

③

Focus on Collective Action and Discourse Framing. The study identifies how technology refusal moves beyond isolated non-use to examine how narrative framing, shared motivations, and organized collective action shape systemic resistance to technology deployment.

Team

Jasmine McNearly

Jasmine McNealy is an attorney, critical public interest technologist, and social scientist who studies emerging media & technology with a view toward influencing law and policy.

Recent Projects

Research

January 1, 2026