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Transforming Relations between Technoscience and Politics in an Age of ‘Post-democracy’?

Citizenship
Civil Society
Democracy
Public Policy
Protests
Technology
P439
Kathrin Braun
Universität Stuttgart
Heidrun Åm
Norwegian University of Science & Technology, Trondheim
Linda Soneryd
University of Gothenburg

Building: BL16 Georg Morgenstiernes hus, Floor: 2, Room: GM 206

Saturday 14:00 - 15:40 CEST (09/09/2017)

Abstract

The year 2016 has intensified the sense of a fundamental crisis in liberal democracies. Democratic institutions are challenged by low voter turnouts, the coining of ‘alternative facts’ as legitimate state communication, anti-intellectual resentments, and resentments against the ‘displacement of politics’ into opaque spheres such as financial markets or expert bodies. Simultaneously and somehow paradoxically, practices and arrangements of participatory governance and deliberative policymaking have proliferated; an abundance of formats, concepts, and institutional innovations have developed to democratize governance and policy-making and make them more accountable, responsible, sustainable, or inclusive. However, deliberative and participatory processes have also been subject to skepticism and critique. Apparently, they often fail to concretely impact political or industrial decision-making, contribute to problem solving, and/or obliterate the perceived gap between governments and citizens. This panel approaches the issue through the lenses of relations between technoscience and democracy. We focus on the dynamic, unfolding interrelations between civic activism, technoscientific development, technoscientific governance and participatory arrangements in order to better understand the dynamics that foster or impede efforts to make technoscience more accountable. How does the apparent contradiction between the trend towards deliberation and civic participation in this issue area and the contemporaneous trend towards ‘post-truth’ post-democracy relate to each other? Exploring a practice perspective in Critical Policy Studies, we discuss how we can use relational approaches to study these contradictory developments. In particular, we explore how relational approaches such as a practice perspective or a pragmatist sociology of critique may explain and possibly improve the dynamic relations between scholars and practitioners. In particular, we seek to explore the relations between practices and activism in order to contribute to the development of non-dualist, relational approaches in Critical Policy Studies. Question we will explore are, how and why do some issues become a matter of public concern, contestation, and critique, and others not? How do efforts of making technoscience more accountable emerge from dynamic interrelations between civic activism, technoscientific governance and participatory experiments? What is the role and the responsibility of the policy analyst in these processes? What alternative practices of reflecting technoscientific developments do we discern that can be (re-)appreciated in terms of political judgement? How are we to analyze, assess and enact these efforts against the background of ‘post-truth’ post-democracy? Is there a need to rethink claims to democratize technoscientific governance or rethink our conceptual, theoretical, methodological means of analysis and assessment, and if so, how? The papers presented at this panel will address and discuss among other things • practices in which the public implications of individual (scientist/ user / consumer) decisions are explicated in a way that challenges the 'self-evidence' of certain behavior and the associated patterns of institutionalized accountability, • practices that contribute to the creation of a ‘shared’ or `public space’ for reflection and possible intervention and to the disassociation of taken-for-granted relations, • practices that impede or promote the formation of public accountability in relation to technoscience or socio-technical developments, • the question which roles we should take up as analysts in this age of fact-resistant politics.

Title Details
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