Eco-digital agency and imagining sustainable futures in the times of planetary crisis

This paper introduces the concept of eco-digital agency. We argue that there is a need to reconsider what ‘digital citizenship’ should mean in times of planetary crises. The concept of eco-digital agency moves beyond contemporary perspectives on digital citizenship that focus mainly on access, skills – such as digital/data/information ‘literacies’ – and rights. In introducing the concept of eco-digital agency, we seek to avoid depoliticising the question of sustainability and responsibilising individuals for an issue that is much wider at scale and can therefore be considered a ‘wicked problem’. Reflections on the concept are presented in light of results from an online survey (n=436) and our experiment with Imagining Workshops, with adolescents and media industry representatives as participants. The motivation for developing the concept of eco-digital agency is based on the observation that concerns over the Earth and hopes for more sustainable digital technologies and services were expressed in the online survey, but the workshop participants struggled to include these hopes in their future visions placed in the year 2030.