Sofija Stefanović

PhD candidate at the University of Cambridge.

Sofija Stefanović is a researcher and organiser based between the UK and Serbia, where she cooperates with grassroots groups scrutinising and resisting extractive industries to conduct collaborative research and actions. Her work is transdisciplinary—informed by feminist science and technology studies, critical design studies, and grounded in environmental justice organising with local and transnational collectives, often as a facilitator and builder. She is a PhD candidate at the University of Cambridge.

Against extractivisms: technology in the anti-extractivist movement through a decolonial feminist lens

I'll present my research connecting different extractive practices and resistance movements against large-scale projects in Serbia. This collaboration involves active participation in Serbia's environmental justice movement and critiques of relying solely on technology to solve climate and other crises. Drawing from critical design, human-computer interaction, science and technology studies, and environmental justice, I'll discuss how various technologies are used to suppress organising efforts. Through a decolonial feminist perspective, I'll explore how these technologies perpetuate dispossession and repression. Additionally, I'll examine existing concepts and practices that offer potential for "technologies of radical care" within ongoing resistance efforts.