Resistance Technologies: Moving Beyond Alternative Designs

The discourse about sustainable technology has emerged from the acknowledgment of the environmental collapse we are facing. In this paper, we argue that addressing this crisis requires more than the development of sustainable alternatives to current online services or the optimization of resources using various dashboards and AI. Rather, the focus must shift toward designing technologies that protect us from the consequences of the environmental damages. Among these consequences, wars, genocide and new forms of colonialism are perhaps the most significant. We identify “protection” not in terms of military defense as Western States like to argue, but as part of sovereignty. We seek to define the term of “Resistance Technologies” for such technologies, arguing further that anti-surveillance technologies are a foundational component of sovereignty and must be part of future conversations around sustainability. Finally, our paper seeks to open a discourse with the Computing-within-Limits community and beyond, towards defining other essential aspects or concepts of technologies that we see as core values of “Resistance Technology”.

💡 Research Summary

The paper “Resistance Technologies: Moving Beyond Alternative Designs” critiques the current sustainability discourse that focuses on greener software, dashboards, and alternative platforms. The authors argue that such “alternative designs” are fundamentally constrained by market logic and capitalist pressures: they are often bought out, shut down, or rendered ineffective by the need for profit‑driven scalability. Moreover, optimizing energy use alone can paradoxically increase complexity, resource consumption, and rebound effects.

To address these shortcomings, the authors introduce the concept of “Resistance Technologies” – a new design category intended not merely to reduce environmental impact but to protect human sovereignty in the face of a poly‑crisis that includes climate collapse, war, new forms of colonialism, and resource scarcity. Central to this vision is privacy and anti‑surveillance, which they argue are foundational to autonomy, dignity, and survival when automation and data extraction dominate societies.

The paper is organized around three guiding questions: Why, How, and What.

Why – The authors demonstrate that existing sustainable software cannot compete with profit‑driven models, citing “death by acquisition” and the “enshittication” of platforms as evidence that market forces erode any long‑term ecological benefit. They also discuss digital colonialism, showing how the United States, through GAFAM and intelligence agencies, controls the three pillars of the digital ecosystem (software, hardware, network). This creates a new imperialism that marginalizes Global South nations, which lack resources, legal frameworks, and capital to develop independent technologies.

How – The authors draw on critical design and the “Data Refusal” framework (autonomy, time, power, cost) to argue for proactive rejection of harmful data practices. They suggest that reducing data collection is more effective for safety and security than continuous cryptographic patching. The German Advisory Council on Global Change (WBGU) report is cited to emphasize that environmental crises are inseparable from security concerns, requiring holistic designs that embed ecological intelligence.

What – The paper proposes concrete design goals for resistance technologies:

1. Privacy‑enhancing mechanisms that prevent surveillance and enable self‑determination.
2. Anti‑colonial tools that empower local communities to develop and maintain their own digital infrastructure, reducing dependence on foreign hardware and software.
3. Gender‑inclusive security that incorporates abusive partners into threat models, acknowledging that technologies like Apple’s AirTag can be weaponized against women.
4. Conflict‑mitigating systems that prioritize resilience and peace over military escalation, recognizing that military activity contributes significantly to carbon emissions and further destabilizes societies.

The authors conclude by calling on the Computing‑within‑Limits community to expand the set of core values that define resistance technologies, such as communal resilience, ecological sovereignty, and equitable access. They position resistance technologies as a radical shift from “green” alternatives toward systems that are deliberately designed to endure and protect humanity under the most severe climate, geopolitical, and social stresses. The paper thus offers a provocative framework for re‑thinking sustainable computing as a matter of sovereignty and survival, not merely efficiency.