Challenges for Knowledge Governance: The Regulative Capacity of Knowledge Objects

This paper is about “knowledge objects” such as Climate Change, nanotechnology, Responsible Innovation, or GMO. We refer to these objects as peculiar, blurry, constantly unfolding and transforming entities that increasingly challenge contemporary societies. The knowledge in knowledge objects is always plural: scientific, public, mundane, interdisciplinary, speculative, uncertain. Knowledge objects are subject and object of knowledge governance. They create the need for and they enable various forms of regulatory science. Taking this as a starting assumption, we will first outline a conceptual framework by differentiating three distinct forms of regulation in the context of knowledge objects: 1) knowledge objects are regulated; 2) knowledge objects are used for regulation and 3) knowledge objects regulate. Second, we present different empirical case studies which show these regulation activities in an exemplary view. How do these knowledge objects constitute and in some cases transform scientific authority for political advice?