In this paper, we reflect on our experience as science and technology studies researchers who were members of the working group that produced A Synthetic Biology Roadmap for the UK in 2012. We explore how this initiative sought to govern an uncertain future and describe how it was successfully used to mobilize public funds for synthetic biology from the UK government. We discuss our attempts to incorporate the insights and sensibilities of STS into the policy process and (...) why we chose to use the concept of responsible research and innovation to do so. We analyze how the roadmapping process, and the final report, narrowed and transformed our contributions to the roadmap. We show how difficult it is for STS researchers to influence policy when our ideas challenge deeply entrenched pervasive assumptions, framings, and narratives about how technological innovation necessarily leads to economic progress, about public reticence as a roadblock to that progress, and about the supposed separation between science and society. We end by reflecting on the constraints under which we were operating from the outset and on the challenges for STS in policy. (shrink)

Lincoln and Guba provided some principles and four evaluative criteria called “trustworthiness” to guide social science research naturalistically. However, drawing on Science and Technology Studies (STS) literature, a field engaged with methods and practices of science for several decades, one can argue that this approach is not still fully naturalistic. In this paper, we review Lincoln and Guba’s four criteria of trustworthiness from an STS perspective. We argue that the STS literature can challenge these criteria, (...) but at the same time they have the potential to be reconstructed with the help of the materials STS provides. (shrink)

As the field of Science and Technology Studies has become more established, it has increasingly hidden its philosophical roots. While the trend is typical of disciplines striving for maturity, Steve Fuller, a leading figure in the field, argues that STS has much to lose if it abandons philosophy. In his characteristically provocative style, he offers the first sustained treatment of the philosophical foundations of STS and suggests fruitful avenues for further research. With stimulating discussions of the (...) class='Hi'>Science Wars, the Intelligent Design Theory controversy, and theorists such as Donna Haraway and Bruno Latour, _Philosophy of Science and Technology_ _Studies_ is required reading for students and scholars in STS and the philosophy of science. (shrink)

As the field of Science and Technology Studies has become more established, it has increasingly hidden its philosophical roots. While the trend is typical of disciplines striving for maturity, Steve Fuller, a leading figure in the field, argues that STS has much to lose if it abandons philosophy. In his characteristically provocative style, he offers the first sustained treatment of the philosophical foundations of STS and suggests fruitful avenues for further research. With stimulating discussions of the (...) class='Hi'>Science Wars, the Intelligent Design Theory controversy, and theorists such as Donna Haraway and Bruno Latour, _Philosophy of Science and Technology_ _Studies_ is required reading for students and scholars in STS and the philosophy of science. (shrink)

After a sketch of the optimism and high aspirations of History and Philosophy of Science when I first joined the field in the mid 1960s, I go on to describe the disastrous impact of "the strong programme" and social constructivism in history and sociology of science. Despite Alan Sokal's brilliant spoof article, and the "science wars" that flared up partly as a result, the whole field of Science and Technology Studies is still adversely affected (...) by social constructivist ideas. I then go on to spell out how in my view STS ought to develop. It is, to begin with, vitally important to recognize the profoundly problematic character of the aims of science. There are substantial, influential and highly problematic metaphysical, value and political assumptions built into these aims. Once this is appreciated, it becomes clear that we need a new kind of science which subjects problematic aims - problematic assumptions inherent in these aims - to sustained imaginative and critical scrutiny as an integral part of science itself. This needs to be done in an attempt to improve the aims and methods of science as science proceeds. The upshot is that science, STS, and the relationship between the two, are all transformed. STS becomes an integral part of science itself. And becomes a part of an urgently needed campaign to transform universities so that they become devoted to helping humanity create a wiser world. (shrink)

Berger and Luckmann’s concept of “social construction” has been widely adopted in many fields of the humanities and social sciences in the half-century since they wrote The Social Construction of Reality. One field in which constructivism was especially provocative was in Science and Technology Studies, where it was expanded beyond the social domain to encompass the practices and contents of contemporary natural science. This essay discusses the relationship between social construction in STS and Berger and Luckmann’s (...) original conception of it, and identifies problems that arose from indiscriminate uses of constructivism. (shrink)

Jennifer Blumenthal-Barby (2024) argues that “[i]t is time for bioethics to end talk about personhood” (11). The author calls on the field to ask different kinds of normative questions about the mo...

This article addresses some recent tendencies in economic methodology defined as a philosophy of science for economics. I review the problem of normative/positive distinction in methodology and argue that normativity in its past forms is intolerable today but is, at the same time, indispensable for methodological inquiry. Using recent texts by Mirowski and Nik-Khah and by Alexandrova and Northcott on the applications of auction theory as a case study, I compare in more detail various approaches to economic methodology inspired (...) by the science and technology studies (STS) and philosophy of science literatures, respectively. On the basis of this comparison, I show that the STS programme in economic methodology may prove fruitful in the future, but there is still a place for more aprioristic philosophical thinking. Methodology and history of economics also play a fundamental role that goes beyond the descriptive analysis of STS and offer conceptual clarification paired with normative concerns provided by philosophers of science. (shrink)

Engaged scholarship is an intellectual movement sweeping across higher education, not only in the social and behavioral sciences but also in fields of natural science and engineering. It is predicated on the idea that major advances in knowledge will transpire when scholars, while pursuing their research interests, also consider addressing the core problems confronting society. For a workable engaged agenda in science and technology studies, one that informs scholarship as well as shapes practice and policy, the (...) traditional terms of engagement must be renegotiated to be more open and mutual than has historically characterized the nature of inquiry in this field. At the same time, it is essential to protect individual privacy and preserve government confidentiality. Yet there is a scientific possibility for and benefit to introducing more collaborative and deliberative research approaches between scholar and subject in ways that will not violate these first-order ethics. To make the case, this article discusses the possibilities and perils of engaged science and technology scholarship by drawing on our own recent experiences to conduct and apply STS research while embedded in the National Science Foundation. Brief accounts of these experiences reveal the opportunities as well as the challenges of engaged scholarship. They also provide lessons for those fellow travelers who might follow the authors to this or other like host organizations with ambitions of increasing fundamental knowledge about and applying research to the policies, programs, and decisions of the scientific enterprise. (shrink)

Science and technology studies analyses of emerging forms of treatment often result in the detailed display of complexities and at times lead to explicit critiques of particular healthcare practices. Simultaneously, there seems to be an increasing interest in exploring more experimental engagements by STS researchers in the proactive construction of such practices. In this article, I explore the relevance of experimental interventions in health care practices for both these care practices and for issues of the normativity of (...) STS research. By analyzing my involvement in changes in the practice of hemophilia home treatment, I indicate how this care practice was reconfigured, partly by drawing on STS insights on the issue of compliance. I also claim that experimenting with forms of ‘‘artful contamination’’ allow STS researchers to do normativity in the practices they engage with. Such practices of interventionist STS research may be of value for refiguring debates in which constructivism has been accused of being normatively deficient. This may make interventionist STS research a fruitfully risky business. (shrink)

This volume explores Science & Technology Studies (STS) and its role in redrawing disciplinary boundaries. For scholars/grad students in rhetoric of science, science studies, philosophy & comm, English, sociology & knowledge mgmt.

Philosophy of the Social Sciences, Volume 52, Issue 5, Page 290-298, September 2022. Disputes in the field of science and technology studies demonstrate its topicality as they elucidate the prospects for a postmodern world, and William Lynch in his book, in search of a constructive solution to current controversies, employs the dialectical approach of Lakatos and Feyerabend. Lynch takes a bold step to present an apparently “degenerated scientific research program” as a competitive alternative to the established and (...) “progressive” mainstream. The book offers not only a theoretical justification for this “minority report,” but also its empirical confirmation, as well as the possibility of practical and socio-political application. We believe that Lynch’s book actualizes the discussion about the nature of sociality as related to scientific cognition, as well as provokes the question of the possibility of specific ontology of scientific knowledge. However, the internal heterogeneity of the sociology of scientific knowledge seems to be slightly underestimated, which sometimes prevents Lynch recognizing his real allies and opponents in modern STS. Lynch’s approach to analyzing scientific alternatives to dominant paradigms and to science communication practices helps problematize current controversies through demonstrating their incommensurability not incomparability. Hopefully this will increase their mutual understanding and collaboration. (shrink)

There is growing need for hybrid curricula that integrate constructivist methods from Science and Technology Studies (STS) into both engineering and policy courses at the undergraduate and graduate levels. However, institutional and disciplinary barriers have made implementing such curricula difficult at many institutions. While several programs have recently been launched that mix technical training with consideration of “societal” or “ethical issues,” these programs often lack a constructivist element, leaving newly-minted practitioners entering practical fields ill-equipped to unpack the (...) politics of knowledge and technology or engage with skeptical publics. This paper presents a novel format for designing interdisciplinary coursework that combines conceptual content from STS with training in engineering and policy. Courses following this format would ideally be team taught by instructors with advanced training in diverse fields, and hence co-learning between instructors and disciplines is a key element of the format. Several instruments for facilitating both student and instructor collaborative learning are introduced. The format is also designed for versatility: in addition to being adaptable to both technical and policy training environments, topics are modularized around a conceptual core so that issues ranging from biotech to nuclear security can be incorporated to fit programmatic needs and resources. (shrink)

At a time when agri-food biotechnologies are receiving a surge of investment, innovation, and public interest in the United States, it is common to hear both supporters and critics call for open and inclusive dialogue on the topic. Social scientists have a potentially important role to play in these discursive engagements, but the legacy of the intractable genetically modified (GM) food debate calls for some reflection regarding the best ways to shape the norms of that conversation. This commentary argues that (...) agri-food scholars interested in promoting a more constructive agri-food biotechnology discussion could do so by blending key insights, as well as guarding against key shortcomings, from the fields of science communication and science and technology studies (STS). Science communication’s collaborative and translational approach to the public understanding of science has proven pragmatically valuable to scientists in academia, government, and private industry, but it has too often remained wedded to deficit model approaches and struggled to explore deeper questions of public values and corporate power. STS’s critical approach has highlighted the need for multi-stakeholder power-sharing and the integration of diverse knowledge systems into public engagement, but it has done little to grapple with the prevalence of misinformation in movements against GM foods and other agri-food biotechnologies. Ultimately, a better agri-food biotechnology conversation will require a strong foundation in scientific literacy as well as conceptual grounding in the social studies of science. The paper concludes by describing how, with attention to the structure, content, and style of public engagement in the agri-food biotechnology debates, social scientists can play a productive conversational role across a variety of academic, institutional, community-level, and mediated contexts. (shrink)

Our review essay contributes to the long-standing and vibrant discussion in science and technology studies (STS) on methods, methodologies, and theory–method relationships. We aim to improve the reflexivity of research by unpacking the often implicit assumptions that imbue research conduct and by offering practical tools through which STS researchers can recognize their research designs and think through them in a new way. To achieve these aims, we analyze different compositions of theories, methods, and empirics in three different (...) STS approaches—actor–network theory, the biography of artifacts and practices, and ethnomethodology—by employing the concept of a theory–methods package (TMP). A selection of theoretical cornerstone texts and case studies in infrastructure research from each tradition serves as our material. Our findings point, first, to differences between the TMPs of the reviewed approaches and to the internal diversity of theory–method relationships in each approach. Second, we found some intriguing similarities between the approaches and discuss potential complementarities of their theory–method fits. (shrink)

It is the purpose of this special issue to acknowledge the shifting definitions and uses of the conceptual and empirical in the field of Science and Technology Studies, and to explore the constructive potential of this condition. In this introductory essay we point to four formulations in STS for the relation between the conceptual and the empirical which do not figure them as binaries or opposites: the empirical as a path to the conceptual, the conceptual as practical (...) and empirical, the empirical as an instantiation of the conceptual, and a conceptual minimalism. We then point to some inspirations in contemporary thought for engaging creatively with the conceptual and empirical, and conclude by summarizing the contributions to this issue. (shrink)

Since at least the 1960s, science and technology studies scholars have distinguished between technological and social fixes. The author introduces a new concept for the STS theoretical tool kit—the cultural fix—and illustrates this concept using examples from her own research on pregnancy loss and neonatal intensive care, as well as that of anthropologists Katherine Newman and Sherry Ortner on downward mobility and unemployment in the United States. It is argued that the cultural fix represents a distinctive anthropological (...) contribution to the field. (shrink)

Since at least the 1960s, science and technology studies scholars have distinguished between technological and social fixes. The author introduces a new concept for the STS theoretical tool kit—the cultural fix—and illustrates this concept using examples from her own research on pregnancy loss and neonatal intensive care, as well as that of anthropologists Katherine Newman and Sherry Ortner on downward mobility and unemployment in the United States. It is argued that the cultural fix represents a distinctive anthropological (...) contribution to the field. (shrink)

Scholars in science and technology studies (STS) have recently been called upon to advise governments on the design of procedures for public engagement. Any such instrumental function should be carried out consistently with STS’s interpretive and normative obligations as a social science discipline. This article illustrates how such threefold integration can be achieved by reviewing current US participatory politics against a 70-year backdrop of tacit constitutional developments in governing science and technology. Two broad cycles (...) of constitutional adjustment are discerned: the first enlarging the scope of state action as well as public participation, with liberalized rules of access and sympathetic judicial review; the second cutting back on the role of the state, fostering the rise of an academic-industrial complex for technology transfer, and privatizing value debates through increasing delegation to professional ethicists. New rules for public engagement in the United Sates should take account of these historical developments and seek to counteract some of the anti-democratic tendencies observable in recent decades. (shrink)

This article introduces the special issue on middle-range theory in science and technology studies, providing the background to its production and reviewing different notions of “middle.” It begins with Merton's ideas about middle-range theory as a way of moving beyond the production of either descriptions or theories of everything. Instead of seeing the middle as the space between the theoretical imagination and the detailed depiction of everyday practices, the authors outline three ways of thinking about the middle (...) range: as an adjective, the closest to Merton's conception; as a noun, the liminal place between theories, audiences, and levels; and as a verb, a process, a means of making connections across time, discipline, community, and place. A summary of each of the articles in this special issue is provided, preceding a call for further discussion about the role of case studies and the nature of the middle in STS. (shrink)

This article examines the communication networks within and between science and technology studies (STS) and the history of science. In particular, journal relatedness data are used to analyze some of the structural features of their disciplinary identities and relationships. The results first show that, although the history of science is more than half a century older than STS, the size of the STS network is more than twice that of the history of science network. (...) Further, while a majority of the journals in the STS network are connected by weak ties, about half of the history of science network consists of strong ties. The history of science network is thus more cohesive than the STS network. The relatively strong cohesion within the history of science network is associated with comparatively high degrees of intra-disciplinary communication, but comparatively weak ties to only a few related disciplines. The analysis also shows that very few members of the history of science cliques are situated on the shortest path between both specialties. Moreover, given the relatively impermeable nature of the history of science network, the latter partially depends on STS to reach some of the neighboring disciplines. (shrink)

Recent scholarship provides the opportunity for an assessment of the underexplored but promising marriage between science and technology studies and Internet governance research. This article seeks to provide such an assessment by reviewing and discussing, in particular, three volumes: Laura DeNardis’s The Global War for Internet Governance, The Power of Networks: Organizing the Global Politics of the Internet by Mikkel Flyverbom, and Governance, Regulations and Powers on the Internet edited by Eric Brousseau, Meryem Marzouki, and Cécile Méadel. (...) Approaching IG through an STS lens, these authors bring to the fore a number of related issues that political and legal sciences have addressed only incompletely so far, but are crucial to understand today’s governance of the Internet as a complex sociotechnical system of systems. In their research, STS scholars of IG highlight the day-to-day, mundane practices that constitute IG; the plurality and “networkedness” of hybrid devices and arrangements that populate, shape, and define IG processes; the performative function of these arrangements vis-à-vis the virtual, yet very material, worlds they seek to regulate; the invisibility, pervasiveness, and agency of infrastructure. (shrink)

This paper presents reports on discussions among an international group of science and technology studies scholars who convened at the US National Science Foundation to think about data sharing and open STS. The first report, which reflects discussions among members of the Society for Social Studies of Science, relates the potential benefits of data sharing and open science for STS. The second report, which reflects discussions among scholars from many professional STS societies, focuses (...) on practical and conceptual issues related to managing, storing, and curating STS data. As is the case for all reports of such open discussions, a scholar’s presence at the meeting does not necessarily mean that they agree with all aspects of the text to follow. (shrink)

The present volume elucidates the scope of responsibility in science and technology governance by way of assimilating insights gleaned from sociological theory and STS and by investigating the ways in which responsibility unfolds in social processes. Drawing on these theoretical perspectives, the volume goes on to review a 'heuristic model' of responsibility. Such a model provides a simple, tentative, though no less coherent analytical framework for further examining the idea of responsibility, its transformations, configurations and contradictions. This concise (...) but insightful and intellectually rich book offers a new departure in the growing corpus on responsible research and innovation. Scholars of both sociology and science and technology studies will be informed, and at times captivated, by the depth and clarity of argument provided by the authors and by its implications for the responsible governance of science and technology. Phil Macnaghten, Professor of Technology and International Development, Wageningen University, The Netherlands In this highly recommendable book, the authors make a convincing case for bringing social theory into the evolving discussion about responsibility in the context of science and technology. Their argument is stringently developed into an inspiring and promising heuristic framework for analysing responsibility. The book is a model of clarity and deserves a broad audience in science and technology studies, social theory, and beyond. Niels Mejlgaard, Centre Director, Danish Centre for Studies in Research and Research Policy, Aarhus University, Denmark Authors Simone Arnaldi is post-doctoral research fellow in sociology at the University of Padua, Italy. Luca Bianchi is adjunct professor of sociology at the University of Trieste, Italy. (shrink)

The article discusses the methodological principle of reflexivity as formulated within the strong program of the sociology of scientific knowledge. The applicability of this principle in science and technology studies is analyzed from empirical and theoretical points of view. The principle of reflexivity expresses the requirement of scientific universalism: it forbids the exclusion of one’s own cognitive activity and its results from the world totality of objectively observable things and processes, in this case – beliefs. In D. (...) Bloor’s imperative formulation, the principle prescribes applying the explanatory methodology of the strong program in relation to the strong program’s own fundamental theoretical and methodological concepts. The implementation of this principle in STS faces practical problems and theoretical paradoxes. In line with the methodology of the strong program, the author asks the question about the social conditions of the failure of the principle of reflexivity. The author shows that empirically cognizable social conditions for the realization of the principle of reflexivity can be fulfilled. However, their fulfillment does not lead to reflexive work, which presupposes an external position of the one who explains in relation to what is explained. In accordance with the postpositivist concept of the underdetermination of theory by facts, the external position is achieved through the speculative transition from the factual given to the hypothesis explaining this given. The author shows that the external position taken by internal critics of the STS research community becomes the position of speculative philosophy. (shrink)

In April 2017, scientists took to the streets in a historically unprecedented Global March for Science. The event was seen as symbolic of a crisis in the relationship of science and society. This book considers the Global March for Science from a postcolonial perspective to inquire into the toolkit that the academic field of Science & Technology Studies (STS) has to offer. It argues that new concepts and analytical approaches are necessary to investigate current (...) global dynamics in science, technology and society, so as to deliver insights that the recent expansion of STS scholars beyond Western Europe and North America alone is unlikely to provide. The book presents a Programme in Science Studies Elsewhere (SSE) to demonstrate the urgent need to carry postcolonial issues right into the centre of STS's intellectual programme. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: Relativism and the Illusion of Autonomy in Science STS's Janus‐faced Antirealism: Relativism versus Constructivism Why is STS so Antiphilosophical and Ahistorical? The Kuhnian Legacy to STS Why is STS so Controversial? The (Pseudo‐)Legacy of the Sociology of Knowledge The Punchline: STS has Produced a Sociology of Science that is No Longer a Sociology of Knowledge.

Within Science and Technology Studies, much work has been accomplished to identify the moral importance of technology in order to clarify the influence of scientists, technologists, and managers. However, similar studies within business ethics have not kept pace with the nuanced and contextualized study of technology within Science and Technology Studies. In this article, I analyze current arguments within business ethics as limiting both the moral importance of technology and the (...) influence of managers. As I argue, such assumptions serve to narrow the scope of business ethics in the examination of technology. To reinforce the practical implications of these assumptions and to further illustrated the current arguments, I leverage the recent dialog around U.S. Internet technologies in China. The goal of this article is to broaden that which is morally salient and relevant to business managers and business ethicists in the analysis of technology by highlighting key lessons from seminal STS scholars. This article should be viewed as part of a nascent yet burgeoning dialog between business ethics and Science and Technology Studies - a dialog that benefits both fields of study. (shrink)

Classical Marxism is apparently a past topic. But, Marxist methodology is still useful to treat several contemporary problems of science and technology studies (STS). Marx had criticized the capitalist economy of his time and classical economic theory by analyzing the commodity production of the industrial revolution. But, he accepted western science and industrial technology as given factors in the capitalist economy. Though Classical Marxism attributed knowledge to the ideological superstructure of social relationships, it did not (...) treat knowledge production as an economic and social process. Now knowledge, especially scientific and technological knowledge, is an essential feature of the contemporary economy of the developed countries. Now the, critical study of production and distribution of knowledge, the object of STS, is an essential subject of our time. It includes the problems of ever expanding new working class: technical specialists, professionals, software workers, and health-related professionals. They, once independent proud professionals, are now in unstable working conditions. Improved Marxist methodology might make possible such a critical study. (shrink)

Research in Science and Technology Studies (STS) tends to presume that intellectual and political radicalism go hand in hand. One would therefore expect that the most intellectually radical movement in the field relates critically to its social conditions. However, this is not the case, as demonstrated by the trajectory of the Parisian School of STS spearheaded by Michel Callon and Bruno Latour. Their position, "actor-network theory," turns out to be little more than a strategic adaptation to the (...) democratization of expertise and the decline of the strong nation-state in France over the past 25 years. This article provides a prehistory of this client-driven, contract-based research culture in U.S. sociology of the 1960s, followed by specific features of French philosophical and political culture that have bred the distinctive tenets of actor-network theory. Insofar as actor-network theory has become the main paradigm for contemporary STS research, it reflects a field that dodges normative commitments in order to maintain a user-friendly presence. (shrink)

The alleged emergence of a ‘post-truth’ regime links the rise of new forms of social media and the reemergence of political populism. Post-truth has theoretical roots in the interdisciplinary field of Science and Technology Studies, with sociologists of science arguing that both true and false claims should be explained by the same kinds of social causes. Most STS theorists have sought to deflect blame for post-truth, while at the same time enacting a normative turn, looking to (...) deconstruct truth claims and subject expertise to criticism. Steve Fuller has developed a positive case for post-truth in science, arguing that post-truth democratizes science. I criticize this argument and suggest an alternative approach that draws on the prehistory of the field in the 1930s and 1940s, when philosophers and sociologists sought to define the social conditions necessary for reliable knowledge production that might stem mass media irrationalism. (shrink)

This article describes and analyzes the process of institutionalizing studies on science, technology, and society in Cuba, and the social and academic circumstances in which these studies are implemented there. The authors give a brief account of how science and technology have evolved in Cuba over the last four decades. The authors argue that the promotion of science and technological innovation in Cuba has purposely taken the form of social innovation. The authors offer (...) our view of how the changes and demands on science, technology, and education can take advantage of the approaches and proposals of STS studies. The authors consider the traditions of thought that have influenced Cuban culture and construct a specific conceptual framework through which contemporary developments in STS are assimilated. Finally, on the basis of the above analysis, the authors describe experiences of the institutionalization of STS and their underlying objectives. (shrink)

The emergence of nanotechnology, with all its promises of economic, social, and medical benefits, along with dire predictions of environmental, health, and safety threats, has occasioned an active debate in the Science and Technology Studies field, in which we have seen five distinct conversations that frame the discussion. The topical threads include ethics, regulation, opportunities and threats including utopian/dystopian visions of the future, public perception, public participation. These conversational distinctions are not absolutes with firm borders as they (...) clearly overlap at many points. Nonetheless, common to all is a strong sense that control and consequence are significant problems that have yet to be addressed adequately by the promoters of nanotechnology. A final section addresses articles on nanotechnology that exemplify the social construction theory of technology. We include herein a selective summary of this recent body of science, technology, and society (STS) journal literature focused on the social and ethical interactions of nanotechnology (SEIN) that has emerged in the last few years. The intent is not to be encyclopedic in coverage, but rather to seek to understand, in a general way, the key issues and concepts STS scholars are discussing. It is clear that STS-oriented scholars are well poised to grapple explicitly with the cultural, socio-political, and ethical dimensions of nanotechnology. Drawing on understandings of earlier socio-technical areas of interest and concern—nuclear power, genetically modified organisms, the human genome—such scholars have moved well beyond the questions of whether and where nanotechnology intersects society. More important is their effort to seek an understanding in depth of exactly how they are socio-politically, culturally, and ethically interconnected. In doing so, SEIN studies have at the same time become increasingly diverse and more sophisticated and mature over the course of the past decade. Scholars have quite rightly recognized the inadequacies of blanket ideas of moratoria versus non-regulatory environments, utopian versus dystopian futures, and whether or not the public has a role to play in nanotechnology decision making. Rather, a more sophisticated, often case specific, flexible understanding of the societal context of a given issue or concern is called for. (shrink)

Science and technology studies and the emerging field of data science share surprising elective affinities. At the growing intersections of these fields, there will be many opportunities and not a few thorny difficulties for STS scholars. First, I discuss how both fields frame the rollout of data science as a simultaneously social and technical endeavor, even if in distinct ways and for diverging purposes. Second, I discuss the logic of domains in contemporary computer, information, and (...) data science circles. While STS is often agnostic about the borders between the sciences or with industry and state—occasionally taking those boundaries as an object of study—data science takes those boundaries as its target to overcome. These two elective affinities present analytic and practical challenges for STS but also opportunities for engagement. Overall, in addition to these typifications, I urge STS scholars to strategically position themselves to investigate and contribute to the breadth of transformations that seek to touch virtually every science and newly bind spheres of academy, industry, and state. (shrink)

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to examine how the shifting conceptualization of the democratizing potential of digital technology can be more comprehensively understood by bringing in science and technology studies perspectives to communication scholarship. The synthesis and discussion are aiming at providing an interdisciplinary theoretical framework for comprehensively understand the democratizing potential of digital technology, and urging researchers to be conscious of assumptions underpinning epistemological positions they take when examining the issue of democratizing potential (...) of digital technology.Design/methodology/approachThe paper is a constructive literature review that synthesizes and integrates existed literature from communication and STS on the democratizing potential of digital technology. The author attempts to bridge theoretical perspectives from communication and STS by identifying core arguments and debates around key concepts and discussing potential implications of different epistemological positions.FindingsTracing the evolving analytical perspectives of technological determinism, the social construction of technology and actor-network theory, the author argues that researchers should be aware of their underlying epistemological assumptions embedded in relationships among users, technological systems and social factors. Analyzing the contested notion of power in the democratizing potential of digital technology from two contrasting perspectives, the author argues that researchers should recognize both the front end and the back end of digital technology in their analysis. In addition, new challenges of algorithm opacity and accountability in impacting the democratizing potential of digital technology are further discussed.Originality/valueThis study provides an original interdisciplinary theoretical framework by reviewing and bridging scholarship from communication and STS in examining the democratizing potential of digital technology. Adopting this interdisciplinary theoretical framework helps researchers develop a more nuanced and comprehensive understanding of the democratizing potential of digital technology. (shrink)

Science and technology (S&T) policy studies has explored the relationship between the structure of scientific research and the attainment of desired outcomes. Due to the difficulty of measuring them directly, S&T policy scholars have traditionally equated “outcomes” with several proxies for evaluation, including economic impact, and academic output such as papers published and citations received. More recently, scholars have evaluated science policies through the lens of Public Value Mapping, which assesses scientific programs against societal values. Missing (...) from these approaches is an examination of the social activities within the scientific enterprise that affect research outputs and outcomes. We contend that activities that significantly affect research trajectories take place at the levels of individual researchers and their communities, and that S&T policy scholars must take heed of this activity in their work in order to better inform policy. Based on primary research of two scientific communities—ecologists and sustainability scientists—we demonstrate that research agendas are actively shaped by parochial epistemic and normative concerns of the scientists and their disciplines. S&T policy scholarship that explores how scientists balance these concerns, alongside more formal science policies and incentive structures, will enhance understanding of why certain science policies fail or succeed and how to more effectively link science to beneficial social outcomes. (shrink)

In the life sciences and beyond, new developments in science and technology and the creation of new social orders go hand in hand. In short, science and society are simultaneously and reciprocally coproduced and changed. Scientific research not only produces new knowledge and technological systems but also constitutes new forms of expertise and contributes to the emergence of new modes of living, at times empowering and at times disempowering citizens. These dynamic processes are tightly connected to significant (...) redistributions of wealth and power, and they sometimes threaten and sometimes enhance democracy. Understanding this phenomenon poses important intellectual and normative challenges: neither traditional social sciences nor prevailing modes of democratic governance have fully grappled with the deep and growing significance of knowledge-making in twenty-first century politics. Building on new work in science and technology studies (STS), this book advances the systematic analysis of the coproduction of knowledge and power in contemporary societies. Using case studies in the new life sciences, supplemented with cases on informatics and other topics such as climate science, this book presents a theoretical framing of coproduction processes while also providing detailed empirical analyses and nuanced comparative work. It will be interesting for students of sociology, science and technology studies, the history of science, genetics, political science and public administration. (shrink)

As the number of medical and health humanities degree programs in the United States rapidly increases, it is especially timely to consider the range of specific disciplinary perspectives that might benefit students enrolled in these programs. This paper discusses the inclusion of one such perspective from the field of Science and Technology Studies The author asserts that STS benefits students in the medical and health humanities in four particular ways, by: challenging the “progress narrative” around the advancement (...) of biomedicine as scientific practice, evaluating the meaning of technology, especially in how technology orients us towards sickness and how health technology is in turn shaped by social and cultural values, assessing the plurality of biomedical epistemologies, rather than assuming biomedicine is one, cohesive body of knowledge that does not differ across contexts, and critiquing bias in biomedical practice and science, especially in the marginalization of women’s voices and in the racial and postcolonial trajectories of contemporary biomedicine. The paper discusses the theoretical importance of these four trajectories to the medical and health humanities, as well as the venues for inclusion of STS within coursework and programming at Case Western Reserve University. The paper also comments on how programming at other institutions might be adapted to incorporate STS scholarship. By drawing on numerous examples of research in the anthropology, sociology, history, and the philosophy of science, this article seeks to open a conversation about the value of science and technology studies to health humanities pedagogy. (shrink)

The topic of expertise has become especially lively in recent years in academic discussions and debates about the politics of science. It is easy to understand why the topic holds such strong interest in Science & Technology Studies and related fields. There are at least two basic reasons for such interest. One is that experts are undoubtedly important in modern societies, and the other is that trends in STS research tend to be critical of the cognitive (...) authority associated with the public role of the expert. Putting the two together, STS researchers often align themselves with environmentalist and other movements that question the impartiality of experts and seek to democratize decisions about science and technology. Though such alignment is in many respects laudable, it can also be a source of confusion and misplaced political criticism. Toward the end of this brief synopsis of current STS research and debates on the topic of expertise, I will suggest an alternative agenda for engaging the politics of science and technology. (shrink)

After reviewing portions of the 21st Century Nanotechnology Research and Development Act that call for examination of societal and ethical issues, this essay seeks to understand how nanoethics can play a role in nanotechnology development. What can and should nanoethics aim to achieve? The focus of the essay is on the challenges of examining ethical issues with regard to a technology that is still emerging, still ‘in the making.’ The literature of science and technology studies (STS) (...) is used to understand the nanotechnology endeavor in a way that makes room for influence by nanoethics. The analysis emphasizes: the contingency of technology and the many actors involved in its development; a conception of technology as sociotechnical systems; and, the values infused (in a variety of ways) in technology. Nanoethicists can be among the many actors who shape the meaning and materiality of an emerging technology. Nevertheless, there are dangers that nanoethicists should try to avoid. The possibility of being co-opted from working along side nanotechnology engineers and scientists is one danger that is inseparable from trying to influence. Related but somewhat different is the danger of not asking about the worthiness of the nanotechnology enterprise as a social investment in the future. (shrink)

Science and Technology Studies (STS) является одним из ведущих мировых трендов в философскомеждисциплинарных исследованиях, который обнаруживает явные параллели с российской традицией философии науки и науковедения. Анализ этой предметной области показывает, что перед STS сегодня стоят по крайней мере две задачи: избежать собственного идейного застоя и внести практический вклад во взаимоотношения науки и общества. Первая в целом решается в междисциплинарном взаимодействии философии и других дисциплин, изучающих науку. Решение второй задачи состоит в том, чтобы поддерживать баланс между нормой культурной (...) автономии научного исследования, с одной стороны, и фактическим бытием науки как социального института – с другой. Обе эти задачи изначально предполагают акцент на философской точке зрения и некоторое снижение технологизма, свойственное STS. Нужно осмысление эмпирического бытия науки поставить в зависимость от изначальных задач философской рефлексии: соразмерить многообразие реальности с культурноисторическим разнообразием духа. (shrink)

This article presents a brief argument for STS studies as grounded in fundamental historical transformations of the human condition, outlines seven distinct approaches to STS, and concludes with a brief for STS as the new form of a liberal education.

This chapter explores how science and technology studies (STS) have evolved over the past generation. It surveys the contrasting perspectives of philosophers, sociologists, scholars of the humanities, wider publics, and scientists themselves. It describes contrasting views about the practice and purpose for studying the history of science. -/- ISBN 978-1-85168-681-0.

Much bioethical scholarship is concerned with the social, legal and philosophical implications of new and emerging science and medicine, as well as with the processes of research that under-gird these innovations. Science and technology studies (STS), and the related and interpenetrating disciplines of anthropology and sociology, have also explored what novel technoscience might imply for society, and how the social is constitutive of scientific knowledge and technological artefacts. More recently, social scientists have interrogated the emergence of (...) ethical issues: they have documented how particular matters come to be regarded as in some way to do with ‘ethics’, and how this in turn enjoins particular types of social action. In this paper, I will discuss some of this and other STS (and STS-inflected) literature and reflect on how it might complement more ‘traditional’ modes of bioethical enquiry. I argue that STS might (1) cast new light on current bioethical issues, (2) direct the gaze of bioethicists towards matters that may previously have escaped their attention, and (3) indicate the import not only of the ethical implications of biomedical innovation, but also how these innovative and other processes feature ethics as a dimension of everyday laboratory and clinical work. In sum, engagements between STS and bioethics are increasingly important in order to understand and manage the complex dynamics between science, medicine and ethics in society. (shrink)

This study develops a Science–Technology–Society (STS)-based science ethics education program for high school students majoring in or planning to major in science and engineering. Our education program includes the fields of philosophy, history, sociology and ethics of science and technology, and other STS-related theories. We expected our STS-based science ethics education program to promote students’ epistemological beliefs and moral judgment development. These psychological constructs are needed to properly solve complicated moral and social dilemmas (...) in the fields of science and engineering. We applied this program to a group of Korean high school science students gifted in science and engineering. To measure the effects of this program, we used an essay-based qualitative measurement. The results indicate that there was significant development in both epistemological beliefs and moral judgment. In closing, we briefly discuss the need to develop epistemological beliefs and moral judgment using an STS-based science ethics education program. (shrink)

Traditionally, the field of science and technology studies (STS) considered the scientific laboratory as the central site of knowledge production and technological development. While providing rich analyses of the social construction of scientific knowledge and the role of non-human actors, STS scholars have often neglected the university – the very context in which laboratories themselves are embedded – as a relevant object of research. In this paper, we argue for re-introducing the university as a relevant category and (...) object of analysis by using the notion of epistemic virtues to link epistemic culture – traditionally the focus of STS – and epistemic structure – traditionally the focus of higher education studies. Advancing this line of argumentation, we make three analytical moves. First, we explore academic freedom as a specific version of negative liberty that extends beyond disciplinary boundaries. We suggest that academics continuously negotiate academic freedom considering culturally and socially situated epistemic virtues such as objectivity and neutrality. Second, we introduce the notion of humility to revisit scientific knowledge production more generally and academic freedom in particular. Finally, we argue that practicing humility leads to enacting the university as an infrastructure of becoming otherwise, thereby enriching our understanding of universities as distinct and highly complex social spaces with a logic of their own. (shrink)

Looking at the current discourse on how to teach disaster, one apparent gap is that the scientific aspect of disaster is discussed and taught mostly in isolation from its human aspect. Disaster educators seem to be primarily interested in addressing issues such as social vulnerability, community resilience, personal action-related knowledge and emotion rather than the scientific basis of disasters, whereas science educators often fail to make connections between the scientific accounts of disasters and the social and political contexts that (...) surround them. In this theoretical paper, I claim that this disconnect is problematic and that overcoming it is a key to understanding and teaching disaster in a more nuanced and comprehensive manner. Drawing primarily on science and technology studies (STS) on disaster, I explore the potential of interpreting disasters as failures of socio-technical systems, which helps us unearth the inner workings of the complex network of science, technology and society in the wake of calamities. STS challenges the dichotomous understanding of the material and social worlds and takes a view that they shape each other to constitute socio-technical systems. Taking such an approach to disaster allows a synthetic understanding of the natural, technological and human-made disasters that we are faced with in the age of uncertainty and complexity. Based on the ideas of STS and examples of recent disasters in East Asian countries, I argue that disaster education and science education can cross-pollinate in tackling the post-disaster hardship and cultivating responsible citizens. (shrink)

Science and technology studies has perhaps provided the most ambitious set of challenges to the boundary separating history and philosophy of science since the 19th century idealists and positivists. STS is normally associated with `social constructivism', which when applied to history of science highlights the malleability of the modal structure of reality. Specifically, changes to what is implies changes to what has been, can be and might be. Latour's account of Pasteur's scientific achievement is a (...) case in point. Two polar attitudes towards the world's modal malleability are identified: over - and under - determination, which correspond, respectively, to a belief in the inevitability and the precariousness of science as a form of knowledge. The distinctness of these positions reflects a cordon sanitaire between the history and the philosophy of science. Consequently, historical agents are not given full voice as constructors of reality: They are either quarantined to a foreign realm called `the past' by the historian or selectively assimilated to an imperial present by the philosopher. The second half of the essay explores what it might mean to restore a robust sense of reality construction to the historical agents. My case in point here is that of the 13th century Franciscan friar, Roger Bacon, who has been alternatively seen as a mad medieval or a proto-modernist. To give Bacon full voice would involve taking the future that he envisaged as a normative benchmark for judging our own world. (shrink)