Suchergebnisse

Public participation refers most often to participatory political process of reclaiming interests, values and worldviews by social actors who are not professional or elected politicians. This chapter aims at reconsidering this form of expert representation, or civic epistemology, in relation to the tensions and reconfigurations of the Czech environmental movement and issues. The first part analyses the implications of the proposal for National policy for research development and innovation (2009-2015) and the second one discusses three cases of production and use of knowledge in three environmental knowledge production activities (urban ecology, rural and landscape ecology and conservation biology).

Why compare? -- Controlling narratives -- A question of Europe -- Unsettled settlements -- Food for thought -- Natural mothers and other kinds -- Ethical sense and sensibility -- Making something of life -- The new social contract -- Civic epistemology -- Republics of science

AbstractHow do we know things? The question of epistemology – which drives both the sociology and philosophy of science – is also a crucial question for political sociology. Knowledge is essential to even the most basic and foundational of political processes and institutions. In 2000, for example, the transition of power in the US presidential election hung for 36 days on uncertainty over a seemingly simple question of fact: who won the most votes in Florida? A few years later, disputed factual claims about Iraq's possession of weapons of mass destruction unraveled, calling into question key justifications of the US decision to invade Iraq in 2003 and significantly weakening perceived US legitimacy. Yet, surprisingly, sociologists and political scientists know relatively little about how knowledge gets made in political communities, nor how the making of knowledge is tied to other key aspects of political life, such as identity, authority, legitimacy, and accountability.