This article starts from the paradox that, although participation is a defining trait of participatory design (PD), there are few explicit discussions in the PD literature of what constitutes participation. Thus, from a point of departure in Actor-Network Theory (ANT), this article develops an analytical understanding of participation. It is argued that participation is a matter of concern, something inherently unsettled, to be investigated and explicated in every design project. Specifically, it is argued that (1) participation is an act overtaken by numerous others, rather than carried out by individuals and (2) that participation partially exists in all elements of a project. These traits are explicated in a design project called 'Teledialogue', where the participants are unfolded as networks of reports, government institutions, boyfriends, social workers and so on. The argument is synthesised as three challenges for PD: (1) participants are network configurations, (2) participation is an aspect of all project activities and (3) there is no gold standard for participation.

Drawing inspiration from Science and Technology Studies (STS), this article develops an understanding of surveillance as a situated activity. Thus, concepts developed by feminist, Donna Haraway, and actor-network theorist, Bruno Latour, are used to establish an analytic attitude in which the 'situatedness' of vision and technologies is seen as a salient feature of surveillance. Empirically, the article examines how surveillance on a Danish fisheries inspection ship is situated in a specific way. This example depicts surveillance as fragile, limited, and partial, and as an ongoing and sometimes difficult achievement, which involves the work of many different actors. It shows how friction and resistance can be part of surveillance processes, and it questions the clear distinction between 'the observer' and 'the observed'. Finally, it shows how, in this instance, surveillance is not only a matter of control, but also of care. The notion of situated surveillance makes the development of overly general conceptions of surveillance (e.g. some interpretations of the Panopticon) problematic. Thus, it urges the researcher to study surveillance empirically, in specific settings.

During the past decade, several governmental reports have discussed how information technology can transform Danish society. Most important among these reports is Digital Denmark from 1999.In this article, the authors examine how to analyze Digital Denmark by considering two strategies for engaging reports. The first aims at uncovering and making explicit hidden assumptions or ideologies in the text. This approach is called “reading against the text.” The second approach—inspired by science, technology, and society studies—considers where a text goes and what it does rather than how to critically interpret it. Texts may be read as material-semiotic actors, having effects on their environment that exceed or bypass discussions of content or motivation. This approach is called “reading with the text,” and the authors argue that traveling with Digital Denmark makes visible the limitations of critical analyses, while adding agency to the report as it moves in between practices.

A B S T R AC T Qualitative research and methods are often imagined as relating to a problematic, which we here term the power-knowledge nexus. We argue that the dichotomy between power and knowledge, instantiated, for example, by recent postmodern contributions to the field, is theoretically and empirically problematic and suggest that they are organized around a 'bad problem' (Deleuze, 1991). This characterization points us towards an exploration of theoretical and practical consequences entailed by the suspension of the powerknowledge nexus. We suggest that there is a need for a renewed consideration of the capacities of qualitative research. We initiate such discussion by drawing on insights and illustrations from contemporary feminist theory and science and technology studies (STS). K E Y W O R D S : knowledge, partial connection, power, qualitative methods, qualitative research, STS Qualitative research as partial connection: bypassing the power-knowledge nexus Qualitative Research

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