75447 2712-9934 7 1 22 2026 1-213

EDI RUS 1-7 0000-0003-4199-5940 Colorado School of Mines Mitcham Carl

1500 Illinois St., Golden, CO 80401, USA

0000-0001-6262-540X Dalian University of Technology Yan Ping

Dalian, Liaoning, China

0009-0009-9334-1026 Shenzhen University Ye Luyang

Shenzhen, Guangdong, China

Introduction: Technological Modernization in a Multipolar World This editorial introduces a Special Issue on “Technological Modernization in a Multipolar World.” It is stimulated by the growing tension between established Western narratives of modernization and the emergence of alternative technological trajectories across diverse geopolitical contexts. Rather than treating modernization as a unified process, this collection of articles approaches it as a contested and pluralistic phenomenon shaped by competing imaginaries, institutional arrangements, and value frameworks. Individual contributions examine how technological systems function as sites of negotiation through which societies articulate and transform their identities, governance structures, and future orientations. Organized around conceptual, digital, ecological, and reflexive perspectives, this set of articles advances a reflexive understanding of technological modernization as an open-ended process unfolding through differentiation with interdependence, it furthermore highlights the challenge of sustaining dialogue across divergent yet interconnected pathways. 10.48417/technolang.2026.01.01 008.2 Technological modernization Sociotechnical imaginaries Non-Western perspectives Epistemic orders Plural modernities https://soctech.spbstu.ru/article/2026.22.1/ 1-7.pdf

RAR RUS 8-26 0000-0001-6262-540X Dalian University of Technology Yan Ping

Dalian, Liaoning, China

0009-0009-7704-1875 Katholieke Universiteit Leuven Zhang Hui

Leuven, Belgium

17344631600 0000-0002-2173-4084 Institut für Philosophie, Darmstadt Technical University Nordmann Alfred nordmann@phil.tu-darmstadt.de Non-Western Modernization? – Technological Development in a Multipolar World This article summarizes the findings of an interdisciplinary workshop convened to explore the concept and possibilities of non-Western modernization in today's multipolar world. Bringing together scholars from China, Germany, Denmark, India, Poland, Russia, Sweden, Ukraine, and the United States, the workshop focused on political programs – exemplified by China, Russia, India, and certain Latin American countries – that pursue technological development while embodying diverse approaches to liberal political values. The discussion was framed by Sheila Jasanoff's keynote lecture, which challenged linear, Western-centric narratives of modernity by introducing the concept of “sociotechnical imaginaries” – collectively held visions of desirable futures that shape technological trajectories across different cultural and political contexts. Tracing the evolution of modernization theory from its Cold War origins, where Western institutions served as normative models, to contemporary programs of “technological modernization” that retain technology while stripping away modernity's emancipatory components, the workshop then focused on a central tension: whether technology can be separated from the values historically associated with its development. Participants examined how universal values become branded as “Western,” interrogating the counterfactual stances underpinning Enlightenment principles such as tolerance, epistemic humility, and the bracketing of morality in favor of ethics. The discussion further questioned whether these cultivated Western stances can be replaced without abandoning modernity altogether – a question complicated by the recognition that modern science itself presupposes non-dogmatic tolerance. Additional themes included the institutional dimensions of universal values, the relationship between deglobalization and digital sovereignty, and the importance of methodological symmetry – treating legal systems, political institutions, and ideologies as technologies requiring equal analytical attention. The workshop concluded that non-Western modernization involves selective adaptation, ethical negotiation, and strategic reinterpretation rather than wholesale rejection or replication of Western models – pointing toward contested, reflexive pathways into uncertain futures shaped by deep political and cultural differences. 10.48417/technolang.2026.01.02 316.422 Non-Western Modernization Technological Development Sociotechnical Imaginaries Multipolar World Order Globalization and Deglobalization Multiple Pathways https://soctech.spbstu.ru/article/2026.22.2/ 8-26.pdf

RAR RUS 27-41 0000-0002-2952-8373 University of Chinese Academy of Sciences Kazakova Alexandra

Beijing, China

0009-0004-8376-968X Nanjing University Wang Siyu

Nanjing, China

0000-0003-4199-5940 Colorado School of Mines Mitcham Carl

1500 Illinois St., Golden, CO 80401, USA

Perspectives on Modernization: Nation-State, Engineering, and the Chinese Project The term “modernization” carries two distinct meanings that are often conflated: an analytical concept in Western social sciences describing the historical emergence of modernity, and a political project of national development in non-Western countries. This paper connects these meanings through a single overarching theme: the role of engineering and engineers in modernization processes. The first section sketches a sociological debate on modernity, technology, and nationalism. It traces the evolution from the universalist theories of modernization and their critique to contemporary concepts of multiple and reflexive modernities. The second section examines historical studies of engineers as both subjects and objects of national modernization policies, with a focus on their role in sociomaterial transformations, underlying state-building and expansionism. Drawing on comparative historiography, it analyzes patterns across the first-wave to the “catching-up” modernization scenarios. The third section takes China as exemplifying a distinctive catching-up approach and postulates a philosophical interpretation of modernization as social engineering, arguing for the need to overcome a narrow, Eurocentric understanding of engineering itself. This framework synthesizes Western critical theory with Chinese philosophy of engineering to envision a hypothetical emancipatory path for twenty-first century modernization. This hypothetical imaginary constructs a perspective on modernization as a creative, reflexive, and participatory process of constructing the social world, where humans remain the subjects rather than objects of progress. 10.48417/technolang.2026.01.03 316.4 Philosophy of engineering Theory of modernization Critical theory National modernization Social engineering Globalization https://soctech.spbstu.ru/article/2026.22.3/ 27-41.pdf

RAR RUS 42-62 0000-0003-0458-5176 Institute of Political Science, Rheinisch-Westfälische Technische Hochschule (RWTH) Aachen University Shcherbak Svitlana

Aachen, Germany

From Conservative to Technological Modernization in Russia: Discourse and Policy The paper raises the question of how to approach recent non-Western modernization programs, taking the Russian “conservative modernization” program and its transformation through the concept of the state-civilization as a case study. Non-Western modernization is based on the idea that technology, on the one hand, and political institutions and values, on the other, are separable, thereby replacing the latter with another civilizational foundation. This work examines the fusion of technological development and non-Western civilizational foundations as the socio-technical imaginary of “technological modernization.” The research question is how this imaginary is constructed and justified, and what it means in practice. The paper consists of three sections: Section 1 offers reflections on the concept of modernization; Section 2 situates the Russian conservative modernization program; and Section 3 examines the concept of Russian state-civilization in the context of “technological modernization.” The analysis of the conservative modernization program relies on a normative-descriptive approach to the concept of modernization proposed in the paper. The normative component includes the imagined vision of a “normalized future” and can also be interpreted as a sociotechnical imaginary, since it fuses the vision of the good life with the technological future. The descriptive component refers to the vision of the current situation and the recipe for reaching the desired future. Examining the conservative modernization agenda reveals its ambiguity, which arises from the merging of liberal, conservative, and technocratic rhetoric. Analyzing the concept of state-civilization through the lens of technological development reveals how the state-civilization framework transforms coproduction, as Sheila Jasanoff defines it, by de-universalizing and detaching Western governance forms from Western technology, and by insisting that they are civilizational choices of a particular civilization, imposed globally as if they were universal. The article concludes with examples of how the socio-technical imaginary of “technological modernization” operates in practice. 10.48417/technolang.2026.01.04 008.2 Modernization Liberalism Conservatism Social engineering De-Westernization https://soctech.spbstu.ru/article/2026.22.4/ 42-62.pdf

RAR RUS 63-79 0000-0003-2506-2374 Perm State University Seredkina Elena

Perm, Russia

0000-0003-3402-3473 Perm National Research Polytechnic University Seletkova Guzel

Perm, Russia

0000-0001-9687-114X HSE University Mikhailovsky Alexander

Moscow, Russia

Large Language Models as Political Actors: Cultural Bias and Epistemic Power The rapid diffusion of Large Language Models (LLMs) into socially and politically sensitive domains raises critical questions about the nature and origins of political bias in artificial intelligence. While existing research often treats bias as a technical flaw to be minimized, this article advances a broader philosophical and cultural interpretation of LLM bias as an outcome of embedded epistemic and value-laden structures. The aim of this study is to conceptualize LLMs as political actors of a new type and to examine how cultural context, language, and prompt design shape their normative orientations. Methodologically, the research brings comparative survey methods to the study of chatbots trained on North American, Russian, and Chinese data. It combines this with philosophical analysis grounded in Actor–Network Theory and assemblage theory. The empirical instrument was an adapted Political Compass consisting of 62 normatively charged statements, administered twice to each model using standardized numerical responses, followed by qualitative analysis of response variability through grounded theory methodology. The study confirms three core hypotheses. First, large language models function as political actors rather than neutral tools, systematically reproducing normative positions across moral, economic, and political domains; bias is therefore constitutive rather than accidental. Second, political bias is context-dependent and dynamically produced through interaction, shaped not only by prompt framing and linguistic reformulation, but also by broader sociocultural and national value frameworks embedded in training data and alignment regimes. Prompt engineering and jailbreak strategies reveal that normative orientations can be activated, attenuated, or reconfigured, indicating a distributed responsibility for AI bias among developers, users, and cultural contexts. Third, the analysis identifies distinct epistemic patterns: American and Russian chatbots share a Western epistemic matrix despite ideological differences, with Russian models combining ideological sovereignty and epistemological dependence. Chinese models exhibit greater contextual sensitivity and partial epistemic autonomy, reflecting a different cognitive grammar. By showing that LLM bias reflects culturally embedded epistemic matrices rather than technical deviations from a neutral norm, the study challenges linear conceptions of modernization and contributes to the understanding of non-Western technological modernization as the emergence of plural cognitive orders within global AI development. 10.48417/technolang.2026.01.05 004.8:316.77 Large Language Models Political and Cultural Bias Prompt Engineering Actor–Network Theory Techno-Social Assemblages Political Compass https://soctech.spbstu.ru/article/2026.22.5/ 63-79.pdf

RAR RUS 80-102 0009-0002-3281-057X ITMO University Bairamova Khumai

St. Petersburg, Russia

0000-0002-9917-6609 ITMO University Gavrilov Anton

St. Petersburg, Russia

0000-0001-6493-3801 ITMO University Kharitonova Anastassia

St. Petersburg, Russia

0000-0002-3224-3934 ITMO University Nikolaev Vladimir

St. Petersburg, Russia

Technological Development Models in the Context of Speech Corpora Imbalance The development of speech and language technologies in the era of artificial intelligence critically depends on the availability of large-scale, high-quality linguistic data. While low-resource languages have been widely studied, less attention has been paid to data imbalances among languages that are considered digitally well-supported. This paper examines the uneven distribution of open speech corpora across languages with established infrastructure of speech technologies and available datasets, showing that this disparity creates structural bottlenecks for sovereign AI development. We conduct a comparative analysis of open and non-commercial speech datasets, accounting for demographic factors, licensing conditions, and models of technological development. To quantify resource inequality, we propose the Digital Resource Saturation Index (DRSI), which relates the availability of speech data to the potential for content generation and consumption within language communities. Our findings reveal a strong dominance of English for open speech resources, while many non-Western languages – including Russian – remain systematically underrepresented. While interpreting these results through the lens of Western and non-Western technological modernization models, we suggest that language inequality in AI is not merely a technical or demographic issue, but a self-reinforcing structurally reproduced outcome of data governance, institutional coordination, and political choices regarding openness and digital sovereignty. The study further provides practical recommendations for mitigating these imbalances and fostering a more equitable technological landscape. 10.48417/technolang.2026.01.06 316.422:004.522 Digital language divide Speech corpora imbalance Language inequality Technological development models Resource disparity analysis Digital resource saturation index DRSI https://soctech.spbstu.ru/article/2026.22.6/ 80-102.pdf

RAR RUS 103-120 0000-0002-8874-4623 Peter the Great St.Petersburg Polytechnic University Vasilyeva Marina

Russia, 195251, St.Petersburg, Polytechnicheskaya, 29 B

Ecological Aesthetics and the Ecological Vector of Modernization in the Far East and the Western World This article undertakes a comparative analysis of the formation of ecological consciousness in Western and Far Eastern cultures (China, Japan, Korea) through the prism of ecological aesthetics. The author examines aesthetics not as a realm of pure contemplation, but as a discursive bridge mediating the transition from abstract philosophical concepts to concrete social and everyday practices of interacting with nature. Methodologically, the research draws on Clifford Geertz's approach to the analysis of cultural schemas, which allows for the identification of cognitive structures linking the ideal and the everyday, as well as on the study of cultural infrastructure (institutions, technologies, legal norms) that shapes the field of ecological action. The work demonstrates that the Western tradition, grounded in a subject-object paradigm and individual responsibility, historically generates powerful grassroots environmental movements. However, in shaping ecological consciousness, it faces challenges of excessive alarmism, manipulation, and populism. The Eastern tradition, rooted in philosophies of harmony (Daoism, Confucianism, Buddhism), implicitly presupposes a centralized, state-led model of regulation. In practice, this results in the high efficiency of top-down environmental initiatives, while archaic patterns of everyday consumption persist. Particular attention is paid to the cultural dissonance in contemporary China, where accelerated modernization along Western lines comes into conflict with both traditional ideals and current Western green standards. The author concludes that ecological aesthetics today is becoming the very field where the tension between the global environmental imperative and local cultural specificity is resolved, fostering new, hybrid forms of ecological consciousness. 10.48417/technolang.2026.01.07 1:008 Ecological aesthetics Ecological consciousness in China Ecological consciousness in the East Ecological consciousness in the West Everyday environmental practices Modernization and ecology https://soctech.spbstu.ru/article/2026.22.7/ 103-120.pdf

RAR RUS 121-139 0009-0009-9334-1026 Shenzhen University Ye Luyang

Shenzhen, Guangdong, China

0009-0003-9910-7907 South China University of Technology Wu Guolin

381 Wushan Rd, Tianhe District, Guangzhou

A Philosophical Interpretation of Nature's Intrinsic Value Grounded in the Marxist theory of value and Xi Jinping's thought on ecological civilisation, this paper systematically explores the core question of whether nature possesses intrinsic value. The article first critiques the theoretical limitations of the traditional instrumentalist theory of value and uni-dimensional ecocentrism, pointing out that under the subject-object relational model of value, maintaining human subjectivity does not necessarily deny nature's intrinsic value. By introducing a relational expression of value, the paper demonstrates the equal status of nature as an object within the value relationship, revealing the logical possibility of nature's intrinsic value. Secondly, integrating the labor theory of value with the theory of innovative labor, the paper analyses the roles of land, machinery, and high-tech production in value creation. It points out that nature's creativity and human creativity possess an inherent unity, and that the latent intrinsic value of nature is actualised through human practical activities, transforming into an ‘endogenous use value.’ On this basis, the article explores the unity of ‘is’ and ‘ought’ from an ontological perspective, elucidating how the creativity of ecosystems intrinsically connects factual judgements with value judgements. Ultimately, centred on the scientific proposition that “lucid waters and lush mountains are as valuable as mountains of gold and silver,” it demonstrates the dialectical unity of ecological and economic values and proposes a philosophical foundation for building a ‘community of life’ between humanity and nature, thereby achieving a dialectical transcendence of both anthropocentrism and ecocentrism. 10.48417/technolang.2026.01.08 316.4 Nature Intrinsic Value Lucid Waters and Lush Mountains Are as Valuable as Mountains of Gold and Silver Community of Life https://soctech.spbstu.ru/article/2026.22.8/ 121-139.pdf

RAR RUS 140-153 0009-0005-1387-4385 Darmstadt Technical University Borchert-Wright Lisa Marianne

Darmstadt, Germany

Modernity As a Conversation – Investigating Chinese Modernity The investigation of this paper focuses on the question of how to understand modernity between all different instances called modern. Understanding modernity as a universal might only acknowledge a European modernity, while there are non-western countries like China, that have also become modern countries, without having had a trajectory of thinking towards modern concepts. Where modernity as an inherently European way of thinking has set foot, it adapts and evolves into a variant of modernity being influenced by the certain grounds of ideas that it falls upon. Modernity is established by habituation with technological artifacts and their inherent values as manifestations of technological thinking. Yet, the initial thinking that is present in the context which is entered by modernity is relevant for the paradigm into which it will evolve. The values carried by modern technological artifacts can set foot in contexts and cultures that they were not part of initially. Presenting the example of China – a modern country without a tradition of modern thought  –  the idea of an adaptable modernity will be elaborated, a concept of modernity that is able to be appropriated and eventually exist in multiple variants. China had a rich and thriving cosmotechnics of knowledge, technical inventions and thought of its own, long before modern China came into place. Traditional Chinese thinking was not focused on progress, growth, or optimization. It had to meet the challenge of modernization, when it was already defining European science and economy. The awareness of modernity’s accidentality might pose an important stepping stone for overcoming modernity in Europe as well as other contexts. 10.48417/technolang.2026.01.09 316.4 Modernity Modernization China Chinese modernization Cosmotechnics Technological Thinking https://soctech.spbstu.ru/article/2026.22.9/ 140-153.pdf

RAR RUS 154-186 0009-0009-1477-3649 Technical University of Darmstadt Brenneis Andreas

Darmstadt, Germany

0000-0002-6580-6019 Technical University of Darmstadt Wiengarn Jörn

Darmstadt, Germany

Performative Modes of Modeling the Future: A Comparison of Two Club of Rome Reports Predictive models increasingly function not only as representations of possible futures but as action-guiding instruments that orient present decision-making, a point emphasized in the growing literature on modeling for policy. Building on recent calls for a hermeneutic turn in Technology Assessment–especially Grunwald’s claim that models carry implicit narratives, values, and audience assumptions–this paper investigates a dimension that has received little explicit attention: the affective and motivational ways in which models seek to provide pragmatic orientation. We introduce the concept of performative modes to capture ideal-typical ways in which model-based futures are designed to intervene in their present (e.g., to warn, reassure, instill hope, or recommend action), rather than merely informing audiences. Methodologically, we develop a hermeneutic approach to model-text conglomerates and apply it comparatively to two influential reports to the Club of Rome: The Limits to Growth (1972) and its 50-year update Earth for All (2022). We reconstruct each report’s structure, modeling architecture, the role of technology, and rhetorical framing, drawing on the reports’ texts, contextual materials, and reception to interpret how modeled scenarios position and mobilize their readership. Our analysis shows a marked shift in performative orientation. Limits to Growth combines a technocratic posture with an upstirring warning mode: it foregrounds epistemic novelty and dramatizes “overshoot and collapse” to generate awareness and trigger debate, while offering comparatively abstract guidance. Earth for All, by contrast, largely presupposes public awareness and deploys a hopeful, action-oriented mode: it frames a “Giant Leap” as feasible, centers wellbeing metrics, personalizes futures through narrative devices, and provides concrete policy roadmaps and calls for civic mobilization – while still relying on technocratic assumptions of agency within the modeling framework. We conclude that “performative modes” are a productive heuristic for Hermeneutic Technology Assessment, revealing how models’ pragmatic force depends on audience presuppositions, affective address, and the unstable boundary between neutral projection and normative intervention. 10.48417/technolang.2026.01.10 008.2 Hermeneutic Technology Assessment Modeling for Policy Model-Text-Conglomerates Limits to Growth Earth for All Performative Modes https://soctech.spbstu.ru/article/2026.22.10/ 154-186.pdf

RAR RUS 188-201 0000-0003-0878-0657 Universidad de Salamanca Acosta Benedicto

Salamanca, Spain

0000-0003-1475-4295 Universidad de Granada Kiri Bralind

Melilla, Spain

Tacit Knowledge and Secrecy in the Patent Office The patent system can be seen as an institutional mechanism designed to align the interests of inventors and the State regarding inventions and innovation. Individual inventors seek to protect their technological rights to maximise profits and establish monopoly power, while society aims to promote the sharing of this knowledge to prevent it from remaining an industrial secret. Accessible information not only reduces efforts’ duplication but also encourages further innovation. Therefore, patents are intended to serve as a bridging tool between industrial secrecy and the socially beneficial sharing of knowledge that drives scientific and technological progress. However, the issue is more complex, as much of the knowledge contained in patent documents incorporates implicit features. Often, critical types of information necessary for the commercialisation or industrial application of patented inventions cannot be effectively conveyed through the structure of a patent document, nor can they be easily articulated as clear propositions or narratives. This challenge is compounded by the fact that inventions are not directly replicated or tested at patent offices; their evaluation relies solely on submitted documentation and, at best, drawings. As a result, it can be argued that some level of secrecy is an inherent aspect of the patent system. The degree of this secrecy can vary depending on the technological nature of innovations across different sectors and over time. We argue that there is an urgent need for more efficient patent evaluation systems that can better address these informational challenges. 10.48417/technolang.2026.01.11 347.77:001.102 Information Knowledge Patent documents Patent offices Examiners Trade secrecy https://soctech.spbstu.ru/article/2026.22.11/ 188-201.pdf

RAR RUS 203-212 Chongqing University Yafei Huang

Shazheng, China

Back to “Reality”: A Review of Cheng Lin’s RoboHumanities: Imaginations, Narratives, and Ethics regarding Robots Cheng Lin's RoboHumanities: Imaginations, Narratives, and Ethics regarding Robots is the first Chinese monograph to systematically examine the core cultural concept of the “robot” from a literary studies perspective. Accordingly, the book aims to fill a relevant research gap and to establish an interdisciplinary humanities framework. The author adopts a research methodology that combines conceptual history and interdisciplinary analysis. Through etymological examination and cultural-historical tracing of the term “robot” and related concepts (such as “automaton” and “android”), the work clarifies the conceptual evolutionary trajectory and advocates for a present‑oriented, near‑future thought experiment designed to guide the public in daily ethical reflection on technology. Furthermore, assuming a pragmatic “Back to Reality” stance, the author attempts to balance visions of the far future, the near‑future application of technology, and current social reality, while deepening the discussion through a multi‑dimensional subdivision of robots into body‑simulating, intelligence‑simulating, and life‑simulating types. The review concludes that, although the work has limitations in covering the global diversity of robotic cultures and in the empirical grounding of certain analyses, it successfully applies literary research methods to the field of techno‑humanities. It clearly demonstrates the unique pathways and the necessity for humanities scholars to engage in interdisciplinary dialogue, thereby laying a solid foundation for the positioning and international conversation of RoboHumanities research. 10.48417/technolang.2026.01.12 007.524: 82-311.9 RoboHumanities Robot Science fiction studies Conceptual history Interdisciplinary Research https://soctech.spbstu.ru/article/2026.22.12/ 203-112.pdf