In their article on 'sociotechnical matters', Hess and Sovacool (2020) draw on extant STS scholarship to unpack 'the black box' of sociotechnical contributions to social science studies of energy. Notably absent in their synthesis is explicit attention to temporality and to the impact of temporal dimensions on the politics of material change. We argue that temporality is a key analytical entry point to unpack how energy infrastructure changes. Using the case of transitions to low-carbon mobility in urban transport in Bergen, Norway, we highlight how attention to temporality enables us to not only understand and explain, but also engage with and influence, changes in sociotechnical matters. Empirically, we deconstruct the ongoing development of car-free zones in Bergen's suburban spaces, and show how the temporal organisation of events is a key constraint in the project. Car-free zone planning occurs within a continuously evolving context, with trade-offs between requisite time to build sufficient knowledge, fast-approaching project deadlines, and the timing of parallel synergistic processes. An analytical appreciation of the significance of time in setting and swaying the politics of material change is, we argue, instrumental to both unpacking the black box of sociotechnical matters and to informing and impacting change. ; publishedVersion
In this paper, we address the issue of the future of a particular field of research in social science: Science and Technology Studies (STS). Although this is a very young research field, its history is already diverse and its evolutions are fastly moving on. Its rapid expansion and its characteristic feature of crossing disciplinary boundaries are making it an interesting case to study, which takes a particular place in the overall history – and future – of social changes. As we shall indicate, STS have an increasing committment for the resolution of sociotechnical controversies. In this paper, we problematise this particular position by underlying the implicit politics of STS research and how they will shape the future of that particular field. Our approach is threefold. First, we give a brief overview of the history of the field and we point out the main evolutions since the developement of the Social Construction of Technology approach (SCOT) in the 1980s that long influenced the field. By doing so, we underline the epistemological critical tradition that gave the field some of its particularities that we address. We show how this tradition brought important insights of "political" nature within the development of the field. Second, our ambition is to highlight new patterns of evolution of the STS field, emphasizing the trends towards both a greater depoliticisation and a more engaged research. By "depoliticisation", we intend to analyse the dynamics of institutionalisation of the field which adopts resources and tools to legitimate itself among the social scientific community. By "engaged" research, we will explore the evolutions of the STS field as inherently political. The field does have an implicit statement in favor of changing social order and an increasing willingness to actually influence that social change. In that respect, research projects in STS often have underlying politics, as we shall demonstrate. Third, we give a concrete example of these new patterns occuring, relying on the growing importance of nanotechnologies, both in the STS literature and research projects. We consider this case study to be intertwined with the development of STS as a field of research. In that sense, we stress that nanotechnologies happened to be a powerful tool for legitimation for the STS community. Therefore, we — as STS scholars — suggest instrumentalizing the interest we have in nanotechnologies in order to observe the evolutions of our field of research. Then, nanotechnologies will constitute an interesting ground to perform a test that will show depoliticisation and engagement as patterning the STS field.
This paper introduces principal-agent theory and its recent application in science and technology studies. First, the text describes the theory itself and its developments in economics and political science. The paper examines the way these disciplines have used it to explain research related issues. Then, it presents specific applications of the theory to science and technology studies. The paper suggests that the Principal-Agent Theory is related to classical theories of the discipline, of which it is sometimes merely a formalization. It proposes, finally, that the theory weaknesses are due to its misuse and its limited development rather than to its real potential, judging by its successful application in other social sciences. ; Este trabajo presenta la Teoría de Principal-Agente y la forma en que se ha establecido en los últimos años en los estudios de ciencia y tecnología. Para ello describe, primero, la propia teoría y la forma en que la han desarrollado la economía y la ciencia política. El trabajo revisa el modo en que estas disciplinas la han utilizado para explicar problemas relacionados con ciencia y tecnología o que los tocan lateralmente. Después se ocupa de las aplicaciones concretas en los llamados estudios de ciencia y tecnología. El artículo propone que la teoría se relaciona con las teorías clásicas de la disciplina, de las que a veces es sólo una formalización. Como propone, por fin, que las debilidades de la teoría se deben antes a su mal uso y a su escaso desarrollo que a sus posibilidades reales, a juzgar por su éxito en otras ciencias sociales.
Tesis doctoral a cargo de Yann Bona presentada en el Departamento de Psicología Social de la Universidad Autónoma de Barcelona (UAB) en diciembre del 2010. Dirigida por el Dr. Joan Pujol Tarrés. La tesis trata de ahondar en las formas en las que iniciativas ciudadanas que tienen por objeto la gestión de la tecnología en el espacio urbano se relacionan con las administraciones públicas. Lo hace a partir de nociones y conceptos de los STS tales como política, composición híbrida o democracia técnica. En síntesis, podemos decir que la tesis responde a la pregunta formulada por Bruno Latour de ¿qué significa hacer pasar la política del lado lo de la técnica?. Nosotros ofrecemos una propuesta centrada en lo que denominamos una sociotécnica de las políticas públicas. La tesis se basa en un estudio de caso centrado una red sin hilos libre y abierta (ubicada principalmente en Cataluña y llamada guifi.net) surgida del deseo e iniciativa de la sociedad civil y que, hasta la fecha, es la más grande del mundo ; Thesis presented at the Departament de Psicologia Social de la UAB by Yann Bona on December, 2010. Directed by Dr. Joan Pujol Tarrés. This dissertation explores the many ways in which citizens aiming to manage technologies in it brings forward certain STS notions such as cosmopolitics, hybrid composition or technical democracy. On a general level, this thesis seeks an answer to Bruno Latour concern with what does it mean to conceive the technical as political?. We offer a set of conclusions based on what we choose to name a Sociotechnique of Public Policy . Our work relies on a case study focused on a free and open wireless network (located in Catalunya for the desire and will of Civil Society wich, up to date, turns out to be the world's biggest free wireless network
This thesis progresses from a 'science and technology studies' (STS) perspective to consider the ways that expert stakeholders perceive and communicate uncertainties and risks attached to carbon dioxide (CO2) capture and storage (CCS) research and development, and how this compares with policy framings and regulatory requirements. The work largely falls within the constructivist tradition in sociology, but also draws on literature from the philosophy of science and policy-‐oriented literature on risk and uncertainty. CCS describes a greenhouse gas (GHG) mitigation technology system that involves the capture, pressurisation, transportation, geological injection and long-‐term storage of CO2 as an alternative to atmospheric emissions. Only few and relatively small applications exist at the moment and research efforts are on going in many countries. The case for developing CCS towards large-‐scale, commercial deployment has largely been presented as follows since the mid-‐ 1990s: climate change mitigation is the developed world's historical responsibility and must be addressed urgently; chief amongst GHGs is CO2, which makes up more than three quarters of emissions; the vast majority of CO2 is emitted from the combustion and gasification of hydrocarbons – oil, gas and coal – for energy generation; transitioning away from these high-‐CO2 primary energy sources will likely take several decades at the least; therefore, CO2 capture systems should be designed for power and industrial emissions in developed countries, as well as emerging economies where energy suppliers will continue to construct relatively cheap and well understood high-‐CO2 generation plants. The development of large-‐scale CO2 capture has thus arisen from a concern with engineering a technological system to address a CO2 legacy in the developed world, and a high-‐CO2 trajectory in developing/emerging countries, rather than on the back of purely scientific curiosity. And the potential for large-‐scale development has been presented on the back of a variety of scientific and technical evidence, as well as the urgency of the policy objective and related aims. Research activities, often concentrated around technology demonstration projects, are the primary focus of the first part of this thesis. In the second part I consider the extent to which research has shaped policy developments, and how regulations have subsequently informed a more detailed research agenda. I follow a 'grounded theory' methodology as developed by Glaser and Strauss (1967) and take additional guidance from Glaser's (1992) response to Strauss' later writings as well as Charmaz (2006) and Rennie (2000), and use a mix of qualitative and quantitative analytical methods to assess my data. These include information from 60 semi-‐structured interviews with geoscientists and policy stakeholders; close readings of scientific publications, newspaper articles, policies and regulatory documents; statistical evidence from a small survey; quantitative analysis of newspaper articles; and social network analysis (SNA) of scientific co-‐authorship networks. Theory is drawn from STS literature that has been appropriate to address case study materials across each of the 7 substantive chapters. The first section of the thesis considers expert claims, with a focus on geoscience research, and draws on literature from the closely related 'social shaping of technology' (SCOT) and 'sociology of scientific knowledge' (SSK) programmes, as well as Nancy Cartwright's philosophy of science. The second half of the thesis draws on the 'co-‐production' framework and Wynne's (1992) terminology of risk and uncertainty, to assess relations between risk assessment and risk management practices for CCS. I likewise draw on literature from the 'incrementalist' tradition in STS to ask whether and how understandings of technology risk, governance and deployment could be improved. Each chapter presents new empirical material analysed with distinct reference to theories covered in the introduction. Chapter 2 provides a general overview of the history, technology, economics and key regulatory issues associated with CCS, which will be useful to assess the theoretically driven arguments in subsequent chapters. Chapter 3 draws on the concept of 'interpretive flexibility' (Pinch and Bijker 1984) to assess a range of expert perceptions about uncertainties in science, technology and policy, and I develop a substantive explanation, 'conditional inevitability', to account for an epistemic tension between expressions of certitude and the simultaneous acknowledgement of several uncertainties. Chapter 4 continues the enquiry into stakeholder perceptions and draws on Haas' notion of 'epistemic communities' (Haas 1992) to assess geoscientists' work practices. I complement this framing with a close look at how uncertainty is treated in simulation modelling and how conclusions about storage safety are formulated, by drawing on Nancy Cartwright's philosophy of science (Cartwright 1999) and Paul Edwards' account of complex system modelling for climate change (Edwards 2010). The chapter shows how shared understandings of adequate evidence and common analytical tools have been leveraged to present relatively bounded and simple conclusions about storage safety, while geoscientists nevertheless recognise a high degree of uncertainty and contingency in analyses and results. Chapter 5 continues the focus on knowledge production in the geosciences and is supported by SNA data of workflow patterns in the Sleipner demonstration project. The analysis shows how a few actors have had a pivotal role in developing insights related to storage safety particularly on the back of seismic monitoring and other data acquired through industry partnerships. I therefore continue the chapter with a deconstruction of how seismic data has been used to make a case for the safety of CO2 storage, again drawing on Cartwright and others (Glymour 1983) to explain how individual findings are 'bootstrapped' when conclusions are formulated. I show how a general case about storage safety has emerged on the back of seismic data from Sleipner as well as a shared understanding among geoscientists of how to account for uncertainties and arrive at probable explanations. Chapter 6 considers to what extent scientific research has given shape to, and in turn been shaped by, CCS policy and regulations in the EU, drawing on Wynne's (1992) terminology of risk and uncertainty as well as legal scholarship (Heyvaert 2011). I conclude that a 'rational-‐instrumental' interpretation of uncertainty and precaution has furnished a compartmentalised understanding of risk assessment and risk management practices. Chapter 7 continues to look at the ways that risk assessment methodologies influence risk management practices through a case study of the Mongstad CCS demonstration project in Norway. I draw on 'incrementalist' literature (Lindblom 1979; Woodhouse and Collingridge 1993) to consider alternative conceptualisations of technology development and risk management when expectations clash with scientific uncertainties and criticism. Chapter 8 draws on insights from across STS (Downs 1972; Collingridge and Reeve 1986; Wynne 1992) to create a novel conceptual model that accounts for recent years' developments in CCS governance. Here I conclude that setbacks and criticisms should be expected when analyses have largely presented CCS as a technical problem rather than a socially contingent system. Following Stirling (2010) I conclude that scientists and policymakers should instead strive to present complexity in their analyses and to engage with wider publics (Yearley 2006) when technical analysis is inseparable from socially mediated indeterminacies (Wynne 1992), to increase the chance of more successful engagement practices (Wynne 2006). The conclusions at the end of the thesis seek to draw out interpretive and instrumental lessons learned throughout.
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 (STS) 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.
In this dissertation research, I try to deepen the understanding of the logic and history behind science of science policy approaches and to substitute for this scientific evidence-based science policy model an evidence-critical and -informed model in which scientific and democratic claims are promoted simultaneously. Science of science policy, or what I call the scientizing science policy (SSP) discourse, is a strategic response of science policy community members to the following two socio-political developments: the government performance management reform movement and a new social contract of science. These two developments have motivated the science policy community to construct new science R&D management strategies that make science R&D investment more effective and economically beneficial than before. Former Presidential Science Advisor John Marburger played an important role in articulating an SSP approach at the federal level that opened up a political space for the larger SSP discourse to emerge and take hold. Other heterogeneous science policy community actors, including science agency managers and academic researchers, have also engaged and played major roles in shaping the premises, strategies, and directions that make up the SSP discourse by articulating their own approaches to SSP. The SSP discourse constitutes a series of strategies such as economizing and quantifying R&D investment decisions. In particular, to implement the ideas of performance reform and a new social contract of science in the field of science policy and management, the SSP community members have prioritized the development of data, models, and evidence related to federal R&D investment by funding studies on new scientific data, tools, and quantitative methods through the National Science Foundation (NSF) Science of Science and Innovation Policy (SciSIP) program. Interagency collaboration organized and supported by the Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) is another key feature promoted by the SSP community. Through this research of the rise and development of the SSP discourse, I emphasize the following aspects that are relevant to both science policy practice and research community members. First, the SSP discourse demonstrates the influence of the performance reform movement on science, technology, and innovation policy and R&D management. Second, the SSP discourse has the strong potential to shift science policy makers' focus from planning and implementing to evaluating federal R&D programs. Third, the SSP discourse not only reflects, but also promotes the tendency of public policy makers, politicians, and the public to rely on scientific claims and evidence when they are engaged in discussions or policy decision making processes related to science and technology. Fourth, the SSP discourse alters the balance of authority and influence among science policy actors, including science agency managers, scientists, and executive branch offices in the decision making process on federal R&D priority and investment. Fifth, even though there are conflicts and disagreements among science policy community members on the visions and future of the NSF SciSIP program, the SSP discourse is valuable as a space in which heterogeneous science policy research and practice community members can interact, learn from each other, and collaborate to develop U.S. science, technology, and innovation policy. I conclude by proposing an evidence-critical and -informed science policy in which the SSP discourse contributes to promoting democratic values in the science policy decision process. In particular, the evidence-critical and -informed model focuses on not only using scientific data and evidence when making federal R&D decisions, but also on promoting the democratic and deliberative process in monitoring R&D activities' performance and social outcomes. In this model, I view the public as a legitimate stakeholder for evaluating federal R&D investment. This evidence-informed model can be implemented under the SSP discourse if the new R&D data, models, and tools developed by the NSF SciSIP-funded research are coupled with a new government performance website in which the public can access information about federal R&D activities as well as provide feedback about R&D investments to science policy makers. ; Ph. D.
In Totalitarian Science and Technology Paul Josephson considers how physicists, biologists, and engineers have fared in totalitarian regimes. Adolph Hitler and Joseph Stalin relied on scientists and engineers to build the infrastructure of their states. The military power of their regimes was largely based on the discovery of physicists and biologists. They sought to use biology to transform nature, including their citizens, with murderous effect in Nazi Germany. They expected scientists to devote themselves entirely to the goals of the state, and were intolerant of deviation from state-sponsored programs and ideology. As a result, physicists, biologists, and engineers suffered from the consequences of ideological interference in their work. Many lost their jobs; others were arrested and disappeared in prisons. In physics, this meant rejection of the theory of relativity, in biology in the USSR, the rejection of modern-day genetics.In this revised, on-line edition, Josephson also analyzes the uses of science and technology in such authoritarian regimes as the Soviet Union, National Socialist Germany, North Korea, the People's Republic of China, and Cuba. He argues that politics plays an important role in shaping research and development in all countries, but nowhere with greater risk to citizens and the environment than in closed political systems. ; https://digitalcommons.colby.edu/facultybooks/1001/thumbnail.jpg
This dissertation investigates the history of Science Studies (or Science and Technology Studies, STS) as it became a distinct area of expertise and academic inquiry during the Cold War. The dissertation pursues five distinct histories, each focused on a confined mode of analysis of science that articulated, evaluated, and rationalized Cold War sensibilities and concerns. The case studies in question are : (1) UNESCO and the framework of "scientific humanism" promoted by its two visionary founders, Julian Huxley and Joseph Needham, and implemented in UNESCO's major history of science project, History of Mankind, in the 1950s and 1960s; (2) the Congress for Cultural Freedom and its quest, in the 1960s and 1970s, to promote "science studies" as part of its broader agenda to offer a renewed, "post-Marxist," framework for liberalism, (3) the Salk Institute for Biological Studies, which in the first ten years of its existence, 1962-1972, undertook the bold initiative of launching a sustained inquiry into social studies of modern biology; (4) the short-lived "philosophical phase" in medical ethics, marked by medical ethicists' interest in and appropriations from post-positivist philosophy of science, which I explore by analyzing the series of workshops organized under the auspices of the Hastings Center in the late 1970s and early 1980s; and (5) a particular mode of reflection on science and its intellectual foundations developed by Soviet philosophers in the 1960s - 1970s under the name of "naukovedenie." All these modes of analyses of science represent roads not taken. The "vision" of science studies all these groups were promoting is different from science studies as we know it today. Yet these alternative visions, in which the issues of science politics were inseparable from those of science policy, science organization, and science governance, constitute an important "pre-history" of Science Studies. I argue that the promotion of the studies of science as a politically relevant area of expertise, undertaken within existing powerful institutional structures outside academia, helped to legitimize the disciplinary identity of science studies in the age of the Cold War
From a seminary for newly freedwomen in the 19th century "Deep South" of the United States to a "Model Institution for Excellence" in undergraduate science, technology, engineering, and math education, the narrative of Spelman College is a critical piece to understanding the overall history and socially constructed nature of science and higher education in the U.S. Making a place for science at Spelman disrupts and redefines the presumed and acceptable roles of African American women in science and their social, political and economic engagements in U.S society as a whole. Over the course of 16 months, I explore the narrative experiences of members of the Spelman campus community and immerse myself in the environment to experience becoming of member of a scientific community that asserts a place for women of African descent in science and technology and perceives this positionality as positive, powerful and the locus of agency.My intention is to offer this research as an in-depth ethnographic presentation of intentional science learning, knowledge production and practice as lived experiences at the multiple intersections of the constructs of race, gender, positionality and U.S science itself. In this research, I am motivated to move the contemporary discourse of diversifying in science and engineering fields in the US academy beyond the chronicling of African American women scientists as statistical rarities over time, the conceptual production of auditable subjectivities and the deficit frameworks that theoretically encapsulate these narratives. Spelman students, staff and alumni are themselves, the cultural capital that validates Spelman's identity as a place and its institutional mission. It is a personal mission as much as it is an institutional mission, which is precisely what makes it powerful.
Tentative conclusions on the role of women in science and technology from the contributing studies are the following. First, even though they were limited to European societies and some developed non-European countries, these studies also identify gender differentiation as an undeniably universal phenomenon. The universality of gender differences was already noticed in earlier, especially comparative, studies. In our opinion, the contribution of this book is that it can encourage systematic comparisons of gender differentiation patterns, and not only comparisons of individual data or indicators, and that these comparisons may be continuously expanded to cover an increasing number of European and other countries. Second, in the light of these studies, gender inequalities prove to be impregnated with the effects of the given society, its economic, political, technoscientific and socio-cultural specificities. This is most obvious in cross-county comparisons, proving that relations between economic and technoscientific development on one hand, and gender (in)equality on the other, have no simple, regular, or even easily interpretable patterns. European social space, not to mention global space, is highly differentiated in terms of gender inequality, and certain types of European societies can also be identified and can be related to their socio-historical background (the post-socialist societies, for example). Third, despite the gender differences in research performance corroborated here, these same differences were also relativised by the findings of two very different scientific and social milieux, with far-reaching cognitive and social implications. These findings imply that simple comparisons of the number and visibility of publications should give way to more complex comparisons and studies on the efficiency and purpose of the publication strategies of men and women scientists, and also to re-examining the evaluation criteria for scientists' production. Fourth, it has been shown that, in terms of theory and methodology, the application, modification and development of theoretical models created in STS, but also in other social sciences, crucially directs empirical studies of gender differentiation in science and technology, thus enriching them with more relevant empirical insights. Fifth, although this book does not aim to offer a set of immediately applicable results for science and/or gender policy, all of its findings have a socially applicable dimension. This refers to the analysis of gender policy conceived and introduced by a powerful science funding agency whose experiences go beyond the national level, but also to all other studies from which recommendations for improving women' s positions and roles in science and technology can be derived.
This publication is a comprehensive report on the government allocations and expenditure and performance of S&T in the public sector. The report is published annually. The science and technology activities covered include research and development, training, education and information; technology transfer and technical services (including information and advice)
[Abstract] The emphasis on the realm of Science, Technology and Society or Science and Technology Studies may have the same degree of relevance that the "historical turn" had in the past. It is a "social turn" which affects philosophy of science as well as philosophy of technology. It includes a new vision of the aims, processes and results of scientific activities and technological doings, because the focus of attention is on several aspects of science and technology which used to be considered as secondary, or even irrelevant. This turn highlights science and technology as social undertakings rather than intellectual contents. According to this new vision, there are several important changes as to what should be studied the objects of research, how it should be studied the method and what the consequences for those studies are. The new focus of attention can be seen in many changes, and among them are several of special interest: a) from what science and technology are in themselves (mainly, epistemic contents) to how science and technology are made (largely, social constructions); b) from the language and structure of basic science to the characteristics of applied science and the applications of science; c) from technology as a feature through which human beings control their natural surroundings (a step beyond "technics" due to the contribution of science) to technology as a social practice and an instrument of power; and d) from the role of internal values necessary for "mature science" and "innovative technology" to the role of contextual or external values (cultural, political, economic …) of science and technology. Wenceslao J. Gonzalez is professor of logic and philosophy of science at the University of A Coruña (Spain). He has been vicedean of the School of Humanities and president of the Committee of Doctoral Programs at the University. He has been a visting researcher at the Universities of St. Andrews, Münster and London (London School of Economics), as well as Visiting fellow at the Center for Philosophy of Science, University of Pittsburgh. He has given lectures at the Universities of Pittsburgh, Stanford, Quebec and Helsinki. The conferences in which he has participated include those organized by the Universities of Uppsala, New South Wales, Bologne and Canterbury (New Zealand). He has edited 20 volumes and published 70 papers. He is the editor of the monographic issues on Philosophy and Methodology of Economics (1998) and Lakatos's Philosophy Today (2001). His writings include "Economic Prediction and Human Activity. An Analysis of Prediction in Economics from Action Theory" (1994), "On the Theoretical Basis of Prediction in Economics" (1996), "Rationality in Economics and Scientific Predictions: A Critical Reconstruction of Bounded Rationality and its Role in Economic Predictions" (1997), "Lakatos's Approach on Prediction and Novel Facts" (2001), "Rationality in Experimental Economics: An Analysis of R. Selten's Approach" (2003), "From ErklärenVerstehen to PredictionUnderstanding: The Methodological Framework in Economics" (2003), and "The Many Faces of Popper's Methodological Approach to Prediction" (2004).
Conclusion by the Minister for Commerce, Science and Technology, Pat Rabbitte TD. Taking all of the foregoing into account, this White Paper is something of a hybrid. It is a White Paper with, at times, a tint of green to it. It engages in and sets out a discussion agenda, as well as a definite programme of actions by the Government, following on from the TIERNEY Report and the work of the Task Force established last year to advise the Government on the prioritisation of STIAC recommendations. In Part One of the White Paper the reader will have found a broad philosophical discussion of the rationale for what we are doing. One critical feature of what we are doing is strongly and overtly linking S&T to innovation and also placing it in the context of national development. S&T will be evaluated by its ability to contribute to wider national goals, as a means to achieving them rather than as an end in itself. In Part Two, the reader will have found some discourse and agendae for the future on particular topics such as the role of education, awareness of S&T and national S&T strategy and structures. A White Paper normally marks the end of discussion. However, in the S&T arena, we need continuous public debate to raise and improve its profile, to establish investment priorities and to ensure that the country derives maximum benefit from that investment. Since taking up the science portfolio in Government I have discovered that scientists are good at communicating with each other. But that internal discourse is conducted in the dense language of the learned journal and the scientific paper. Scientists are, I have learned however, less practised in communicating with the wider society and mostly feel themselves under little if any obligation to do so. As science becomes central to all of our lives, I suggest that they must. The worst thing that could happen, following publication of the White Paper, is that the debate will fizzle out. Government has played its part by first instigating the STIAC process and now producing this White Paper. But governments cannot be expected to both lead the debate and provide the response. It is very much the responsibility of all of the S&T community to generate discussion on policy and practical concerns and to demonstrate their relevance to the issues of the day. Visibility, followed by responsibility and accountability, is the way forward.
