Abstract
While Smart Home Surveillance Products (SHSPs), such as smart doorbell cameras, promise safety and convenience, they also reproduce asymmetrical power relations, privileging residents while exposing neighbours, visitors, and service workers to unconsented monitoring. Existing legal and technical responses focus on compliance and system design, yet overlook the interpersonal and affective dimensions of being watched. This paper presents a design-led inquiry into speculative re-imaginings of smart doorbells, aimed at surfacing and reflecting the hidden power dynamics embedded in everyday domestic interactions. We base this inquiry on an understanding of interpersonal power from the feminist theory of Matrix of Domination, allowing us to name three dimensions that facilitate power asymmetry: Awareness, Contestation and Care. We make a call for design to further explore smart home surveillance products not just as a systemic issue, but also as a lived experience of the power they facilitate.
Keywords
Smart doorbells, power, speculative design, Matrix of Domination
DOI
https://doi.org/10.21606/drs.2026.938
Citation
Dideriksen, S.T., Snijder, S., and Cila, N. (2026) Understanding power at the doorstep: Examining interpersonal power of smart doorbells through speculative design, in Simeone, L., Gray, C. M., Verhoeven, A., de Götzen, A., Bakırlıoğlu, Y., Zohar, H., Stead, M., and Buwert, P. (eds.), DRS2026: Edinburgh, 8–12 June, Edinburgh, United Kingdom. https://doi.org/10.21606/drs.2026.938
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License
Included in
Understanding power at the doorstep: Examining interpersonal power of smart doorbells through speculative design
While Smart Home Surveillance Products (SHSPs), such as smart doorbell cameras, promise safety and convenience, they also reproduce asymmetrical power relations, privileging residents while exposing neighbours, visitors, and service workers to unconsented monitoring. Existing legal and technical responses focus on compliance and system design, yet overlook the interpersonal and affective dimensions of being watched. This paper presents a design-led inquiry into speculative re-imaginings of smart doorbells, aimed at surfacing and reflecting the hidden power dynamics embedded in everyday domestic interactions. We base this inquiry on an understanding of interpersonal power from the feminist theory of Matrix of Domination, allowing us to name three dimensions that facilitate power asymmetry: Awareness, Contestation and Care. We make a call for design to further explore smart home surveillance products not just as a systemic issue, but also as a lived experience of the power they facilitate.