The New, the Good, and the Desirable

Barriers and Opportunities for Social AppropriationSheila JasanoffHarvard UniversitySocial Appropriation of Science, Technology, and Innovation Universidad EAFIT, Medellin, October 20, 2007

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What innovation, whose appropriation? ASCTI: descriptive or normative?

Society does appropriate STI Society should appropriate STI

Conventional wisdom Blurs distinction Blames society for lack of uptake

Contrary view Normative theories of appropriation need to be made explicit, unpacked, and critiqued

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What Is Innovation? “Some men see things as they are and say why. I dream things that never were and say why not.” Ted Kennedy, quoting Robert F. Kennedy (1968)

But what have we learned since 1968? Even dreamers need resources to dream with.

Where do those resources come from? Who gets to do the dreaming?

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Social Contract The right to govern seen as a contract between ruler and ruled.

The people give up some rights but hold the king or ruler to responsible exercise of powers.

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The Social Contract for Science

Science--The Endless Frontier (1945)

Basic research as “pacemaker of technological progress.”

Contract: Funds and autonomy for science in exchange for innovation.

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Contractual Assumptions Central dogmas of US S&T policy after

WWII: More science = more innovation More innovation (in science) = more

social welfare National governments have a duty to

foster S&T innovation S&T are self-regulating institutions and

should be left free to set own agendas for innovation

Imperfections exist in the ideal contract, but they can be rectified by three mechanisms of governance (market, regulation, ethics)

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20th Century Technological Visions

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“Big Science”: A Brief History

Focal points: Weapons (Manhattan Project) Instruments (Sputnik, Hubble) Facilities (Superconducting Supercollider) Projects (war on cancer, moon landing, HGP)

Common elements National undertakings Not just science but also technology Big money Distinct (and tangible) endpoints

Assumptions Linear model: discovery, innovation, uptake States know what innovation is good for society

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An Innovative Moment – Buzz Aldrin’s Moon Landing

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Illustrations: 1950-1990 Privatization of nuclear power and “atoms for peace”

Expansion of National Institutes of Health

Establishment of National Science Foundation

Apollo Program and NASA Presidential ethics commissions (1970s-) Bayh-Dole Act (1980) Product framing of biotechnology (1984-)

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Changes in the Landscape Changing face of S&T: technoscience; “Mode 2”;

mission-oriented science; dual use technologies… Disasters and crises of confidence: Bhopal,

TMI, Chernobyl, Challenger, BSE, GM crops, 9/11, financial markets, research misconduct, “capital misconduct”…

Globalization of “the environment” New “convergent” technologies and their social

problems: nanotech, synthetic biology, robotics…

From managing risk to managing ignorance and uncertainty

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Missing Perspectives on Innovation Collaborative and reflexive research on hybrid (cross-disciplinary) knowledge

Long-term studies of Mode 2 knowledge-making: impacts, learning, and transformations

Social science paradigm shifts and “emergence studies”

Knowledge-making outside the lab Cross-cultural studies of science and policy Ethnographies of power (“studying up”) Failure and disaster studies

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Alternative visions for scholars Instrumental (for policy, for discipline) Give policymakers what they want Use opportunities for field development

Interpretive Explain what is going on Critique existing dominant understandings from other standpoints (S&T critics)

Normative Address what is to be done, but not (necessarily) from inside dominant policy framings

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New Frame: Co-Production

Making the worlds we study (e.g., global knowledge, populations [at risk], “geneticization,” digitization)

Focal points Emergence Controversy Intelligibility and portability (standardization) Cultures and practices of research (ethical assumptions)

Mechanisms Identities Institutions Discourses Representations

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Object: Publics Who are the publics the research intends to benefit, and are they included in research design?

How do relevant publics assess the need for more knowledge?

What are the attitudes of such publics with respect to knowledge (Luddites, passive consumers, active producers, patronized outsiders)?

When is consultation appropriate, and with/between/among whom?

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Innovating Forms of Life

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Assumptions of Competence

Innovator Imagined Publics

Gandhi Political competence

Martin Luther King Civic competence

Muhammad Yunus Economic competence

Tim Berners-Lee Reading competence

J.K. RowlingImaginative competence

Mark Zuckerberg Social competence

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Global Asymmetries Captive technological imaginations

Call centers Clinical trials

Liberated social imaginations Khadi movement Grameen Bank

Links and translations National Institutes of Health vs. Ashoka

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Constitutional Moments Formal constitutional amendments are rare in many countries

However, informal changes occur and can be constitutional in effect

Constitutional moments Redefine relations between states and citizens

in fundamental ways Change the terms and/or venues of public

reasoning and justification Reformulate epistemic rights and

responsibilities Are we at a constitutional moment for ASCTI

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US Case: Stirrings of Openness 1946 Administrative Procedure Act Historical context

New Deal struggles and compromises Courts, Congress, and the Presidency

Further developments Social movements and participatory engagements in the 1960s

NEPA (1969) and its environmental progeny

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Rights of the Knowledge-Able Citizen

Epistemic rights of citizenship in post-1960s United States: Right to know

• Of exposure to risks• For informed consumption• To level the economic and social playing field

Right to give informed consent Right to demand reasons Right to participate and offer expertise Right to challenge irrational decisions Right to appeal

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Privatization, Ethics, Engagement 1980s: a sea change

Deregulation End of bipolar world order Rise of neo-liberalism and “market fundamentalism”

Birth of public ethics Introduction of “public engagement”

Persistence of deficit model

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Is “public engagement” discourse a new constitutional moment? New language and concepts

Engagement (not participation), upstream, interactional

New problematizations of the “public” Empty signifier, deficit model, constructed interlocutor of the state, partner, “evidence-based”

New forums and processes Juries, consensus conferences, consultations, referenda

New horizons Anticipation, scenarios, futures

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What should we appropriate, and is “public engagement” the way to get it?

If it restores communication between emotion and intellect, affect and reason, imagination and argument

If it abandons procedures that have Bureaucratized technical reason Privatized values and emotions Delegated deliberation to experts (e.g., climate change)

If it restores Value conflicts to the public sphere Contestation among imaginations of the future Demote science to same level as other modes of democratic

imagination