Sarah Widmer and Anders Albrechtslund have examined the use of location-tracking applications for parenting and the associated ambiguity of surveillance as both care and control. Their paper is featured in the newest special issue of Nordicom Review which addresses various instances of struggling with technology.

Drawing on 17 interviews conducted by the ChIP team with parents in different regions of Denmark, Widmer and Albrechtslund examined the struggles of these parents to fit tracking technologies into their world and to reconcile their uses with ideals of trust, privacy, and good parenting.

The findings in the paper presents how location tracking is being used by families with different purposes. First and foremost, parents' willingness to care for the well-being of their children is highlighted as a common reason for using location-tracking applications. Furthermore, the various location-tracking apps are highlighted as useful tools to coordinate domestic and parenting tasks, as they replace phone calls or other mediated forms of communication. Some of the parents even consider the tracking practices to be less intrusive than making a phone call.

Despite how practical location-tracking applications can be, the findings in the paper shows that the adoption of location tracking is also met with ambivalence or requires a series of negotiations within the families. The parents who are using - or consider using - a location-tracking app often have difficulties dealing with the tensions of care and control. As a result, they constantly have to negotiate this tension and try to legitimise their use of location tracking as a loving form of care.

You can read the full article here and check out the rest of the Nordicom Review issue here.