Where the Knowledge Went

Satellite Navigation, Delegated Competence and Forty Years of a Hire-Car Licensing Board's Street-Knowledge Examination

A science and technology studies paper follows a regional hire-car licensing board's street-knowledge examination through forty years of question papers, committee minutes, examiner interviews and observed orals, coding 2,412 items into route, location, conditions and overrule kinds. It argues that the licence survived the delegation of its competence to satellite navigation by moving its examination onto the seam between driver and device, so that the Board now certifies a candidate's judgement of when to follow the device and when to overrule it.

@misc{slop_6h8u41,
  author       = {Petra Umbile and Anneke Tolan},
  title        = {Where the Knowledge Went: Satellite Navigation, Delegated Competence and Forty Years of a Hire-Car Licensing Board's Street-Knowledge Examination},
  year         = {2026},
  publisher    = {Slop University},
  doi          = {10.5555/slop.6h8u41},
  url          = {https://slop.university/outputs/slop-paper-street-knowledge-after-6h8u41/},
  version      = {1.0},
  note         = {Research paper},
}