We invite applications for innovative sessions (workshops, tutorials, lightning talks, panels etc) to be presented at CRAFT, a program embedded in the ACM Fairness, Accountability, and Transparency (FAccT) conference to be held Jun 3-6 in Rio de Janeiro (Brasil), 2024. Sessions should explore a critical question in computing and AI today from positionalities and perspectives often underrepresented at FAccT e.g. indigeneity, coloniality, feminist and gender politics, racial regimes, communality, AI and its environmental impact, Global South and majority world, etc. In the spirit of widening our community, we invite session proposals from: academics of all disciplines; people in different communities of practice and backgrounds (community organizers, journalists, activists, advocates, educators, artists, public sector workers, etc.); and people directly impacted by such systems. As the first year that FAccT is being organized in a Latin American country, we encourage CRAFT proposals that are rooted in and cater to the specific context of Latin America.

Overview

The ACM Fairness, Accountability, and Transparency (FAccT) conference is an interdisciplinary research venue where social and computer scientists—often in dialogue with activists, journalists, community organizers, advocates, and policy actors—forge best practices in technology, AI and computing. Within the conference, critical scholars formed a dedicated track called “Critiquing and Rethinking Fairness, Accountability, and Transparency” (CRAFT) to build bridges between people who contend with computing systems from many different angles—from journalism and organizing, art and education, to advocacy and governance and beyond.

The CRAFT track presents a unique opportunity within an academic conference to consider the impact of technology on communities and the policy implications that arise from that impact. Centering critique, reflection, and power will help to ground what is at stake in the research output of the conference.

We are seeking session proposals from both academics and engaged practitioners in a diversity of fields to shape the terms by which we discuss, debate, regulate, limit and design these tools. Please submit contributions in the form of workshops, panels, activities, unconferences, etc. to:

• Creatively address critiques of the field of fairness, accountability and transparency in machine learning, data science and other forms of technology -- its gaps, omissions, and possibilities;
• Invite a transdisciplinary and cross-practice group of organizers, researchers, activists and artists to explore and inspire conversation and open future lines of research, collaboration and practice;
• Push beyond the established boundaries of research and practice in the field. Describe community- and advocacy-led solutions to the challenges that biased machine learning and other digital tools present.

Themes

Below we offer a set of themes as a starting point for CRAFT proposals; this list is not exhaustive. We invite organizers to consider framings that take up these themes and provocations from positionalities and perspectives often underrepresented at FAccT e.g. indigeneity, coloniality, feminist and gender politics, racial regimes, communality, AI and its environmental impact, Global South and majority world, etc.

• Addressing algorithmic harms from the position of local experiences and stories.
• Fostering community, collaboration, and engagement with people who are directly impacted by AI systems.
• Exploring democratic and community-led approaches to problem-selection, design, and deployment of AI.
• Exploring algorithmic resistance and counter-power measures from local communities.
• Fostering dialogue on AI futures with expanded stakeholders beyond academics and Big Tech.
• Imagining speculative and positive visions of what AI would do in a liberated world via concrete or visionary mechanisms for positive change.
• Formulating critical and alternative responses to generative AI.
• Possibilities and tensions of globally inclusive AI.
• Understanding the global environmental, social, and legal impacts of technology from different perspectives or on different communities.
• Analyzing the legal framework of AI, for instance in Latin American and Global South countries.
• Analyzing regulation of AI through discourses of power and resistance.
• Highlighting challenges in how AI ethics applies to activist, advocacy, policy, or other work.
• Critiquing or expanding FAccT and the larger field of AI Ethics, through dialogue with overlooked disciplinary approaches.
• Investigating and reflecting on the state of participation and activism within the academic AI community.
• Interrogating emerging best practices, especially those forged at FAccT and taken up in policy settings.
• Highlighting models and institutional forms that support more accountable use of data and technology, e.g., platform data access, worker data collectives.

Acceptance and travel support

We will accept approximately 15 presentations for CRAFT sessions.

Where possible we encourage in person sessions or online only sessions. Our goal is to provide funds that enable participation by organizers of all accepted CRAFT sessions. Accepted presenters will be able to submit via separate applications for travel funding support and for childcare/caregiver funding support, which will be allocated based on need and administered by the conference Financial Support Chairs.

Note that funds will be administered through reimbursement instead of in advance.

While this year’s conference will be in-person, if applicants want to host an online only or hybrid CRAFT they should identify what their A/V needs would be beforehand in the application.

Guidelines for CRAFT Contributors

Session Formats for Contributions

In the spirit of openness, we welcome contributions in a variety of different formats. These may include, but are not limited to the following:

• Lightning talks
• Panels
• Poster and/or Demo Sessions
• Unconferences
• Site visits
• Interactive Workshops
• Art Exhibits or Other Artistic Interventions
• Dialogues across disciplines - e.g. policymakers, data scientists, historians, and advocates

Feel free to propose another format. We especially encourage proposals that feature or bring together people from different backgrounds, such as different disciplinary, epistemological or institutional orientations and bring new communities, movements, organizations, or positions to the conference.

Remote and online Presentations

Please note that the ability to support remote presenters in hybrid sessions is still being finalized and may not meet demand. We encourage online-only or in person CRAFT sessions. To support in person sessions, organizers can apply for travel funding. Please let us know in your proposal if you have plans to organize hybrid sessions with remote presenters.

Proposal Requirements

Submit your proposal via Frama Forms. Your proposal should include sufficient information to evaluate it among other proposals.

• Proposed Title: Let us know what your session will be called.
• Format: Indicate and describe the kind of format you will use for your session. (E.g., Interactive Workshop, Panel, Debate, Unconference, Art Exhibit or Other Artistic Intervention, Site Visit, Poster and/or Demo Session, Lightning Talk, Other).
• Modality: Indicate here if the proposal is in-person, online-only session or hybrid. Please note we may have limited capability to support online-only and hybrid sessions, and thus encourage in-person sessions where possible.
• Description: In approximately 500 words or less, describe the session theme, its central questions and structure. Think of this as the main blurb or abstract for your session that people will read to decide if they want to attend this session or not.
• Goals: What are you trying to achieve with your session? What do you want participants to know by the end of your session?
• Coordinator(s)/Organizer(s): Please indicate the name(s) of session organizer(s), including job titles, affiliations, country (of their affiliation/work) and contact information.
• Speaker(s)/Facilitator(s): If known, indicate the name(s) of any presenters, speakers or facilitators, including their job titles and affiliations. If the program is still to be curated and you don’t know all the names of presenters, please say so.
• Length: Choose the appropriate time duration for your session. The proposed events can be 45 minutes, 1.5 hours, or 3 hours. 1.5 hours will be the default.
• Target Audience Size: Let us know how many people you anticipate coming to a session or how many participants you would ideally like to have.
• Online Participation Needs: Let us know what A/V and other support would be required to enable online participation in your session.
• Other Needs (optional): Include a note if you have any special requirements for your session that are not addressed elsewhere.
• Additional Artifacts (optional): If you have additional materials which would support your proposal, such as a video example of the facilitation, a website or written workbooks, you can also include that in your proposal.

To submit your proposal, use this link: Frama Forms

Note the Tutorials track:In addition to the CRAFT track, ACM FAccT also solicits proposals on the Tutorials track, which welcomes hands-on tutorials, translation tutorials and implications tutorials. If your proposal would be a better fit for that format, you can find more information here.

Evaluation Criteria for CRAFT Session Proposals

CRAFT submissions will be selected by the CRAFT chairs in consultation with the FAccT organizing committee, with selections made by quality and the need for a balanced and diverse program of interest to the FAccT community.

The review process will focus on three basic areas:

1. Planning and Quality: Is the proposal clear, sensible, and thorough?
2. Contribution and Relevance: Is the proposed session likely to generate new discussions within the conference and shift the debates in the field on Fairness, Accountability and Transparency? Does it offer new questions and debates to consider?
3. Broadening and Critique: Does the session feature voices and views that are not often represented in the main track of the conference? Does it expand our current critical understanding or offer different perspectives?

CRAFT Co-Chairs

Please contact craft@facctconference.org for any questions.

• Marcelo Fornazin, Escola Nacional de Saúde Pública Sergio Arouca (ENSP)
• Rida Qadri, Google
• Ana Valdivia, Oxford Internet Institute

Please contact craft@facctconference.org with any questions.