Strengths of Public Dialogue on Science‐related Issues

Jackson, Roland; Barbagallo, Fiona; Haste, Helen

doi:10.1080/13698230500187227

Cited by 49 publications

(41 citation statements)

References 8 publications

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“…Engagement activities thereby seek to influence knowledge production and socio-technical outcomes by augmenting social contexts during malleable stages of nanotechnology development. Influencing technological trajectories is thought to be more possible at early periods "where research trajectories are still open and undetermined" [24], since they take place before "closure" [25] and reification of interpretations and agendas has transpired. Over time, individual selections give rise to larger dynamics of "emerging irreversibilities" [9] or technological "lock-in" [26].…”

Section: Influencing Socio-technological Changementioning

confidence: 99%

Ethnographic Invention: Probing the Capacity of Laboratory Decisions

2007

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In an attempt to shape the development of nanotechnologies, ethics policy programs promote engagement in the hope of broadening the scope of considerations that scientists and engineers take into account. While enhancing the reflexivity of scientists theoretically implies changes in technoscientific practice, few empirical studies demonstrate such effects. To investigate the real-time effects on engineering research practices, a laboratory engagement study was undertaken to specify the interplay of technical and social considerations during the normal course of research. The study employed an ethnographic invention in the form of a decision model to structure reflection on ongoing social processes. A short series of interactions with one engineering researcher illustrates the deployment of the model in the form of an interview protocol. The cultural embedment of the protocol allowed it to function as a feedback mechanism, creating a more self-critical environment for knowledge production, and perturbing the system in research-tolerable ways.

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Section: Influencing Socio-technological Changementioning

confidence: 99%

Ethnographic Invention: Probing the Capacity of Laboratory Decisions

2007

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“…For example, Durodié (2003) argues against the trend to dialogue on the basis that it mistakenly posits that the validity of scientific knowledge can be democratically decided and that it potentially absolves policymakers from responsibility for their decisions. Durodié was vigorously contested by Jackson et al (2005), who not only defended the value of dialogue but extended its reach 'upstream', to deliberation on 'setting the research agenda'.…”

Section: Complex Factors and Clear Choicesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Towards an Analytical Framework of Science Communication Models

Trench

2008

Communicating Science in Social Contexts

241

178

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This chapter reviews the discussion in science communication circles of models for public communication of science and technology (PCST). It questions the claim that there has been a large-scale shift from a 'deficit model' of communication to a 'dialogue model', and it demonstrates the survival of the deficit model along with the ambiguities of that model. Similar discussions in related fields of communication, including the critique of dialogue, are briefly sketched. Outlining the complex circumstances governing approaches to PCST, the author argues that communications models often perceived to be opposed can, in fact, coexist when the choices are made explicit. To aid this process, the author proposes an analytical framework of communication models based on deficit, dialogue and participation, including variations on each.Science communication has been telling a story of its own development, repeatedly and almost uniformly, for almost a decade. The story is a straightforward one: science communication used to be conducted according to a 'deficit model', as one-way communication from experts with knowledge to publics without it; it is now carried out on a 'dialogue model' that engages publics in two-way communication and draws on their own information and experiences.This chapter examines the validity of the claim that we have been living through such a fundamental shift in approach, and considers the possibility that several models, including deficit and dialogue models, can coexist. I argue the need for clearer articulation of the choices being made in science communication practice and propose a framework for the structuring of those choices. From Deficit to Dialogue: a Story Too Often Told?The 'grand narrative' in public communication of science and technology (PCST) since the late 1990s has had compelling force. It has been replayed in policy statements, in academic studies, in debates on public communication within scientific communities, and in public debates on science-society relations. We have learned, the story goes, that one-way, top-down communication of packaged scientific information does not work. Now science communication makes it easier for the public to talk back, and scientists need to listen, so that understandings can be developed together.One of the several remarkable features of this story is how broadly it has been adopted, across the continents and by governments, scientific societies, intergovernmental bodies, civil society organizations and many other interests. To give any one illustration would risk misrepresenting the universality of the process by which a key idea has diffused across the world and been naturalized.There are, of course, local and specific variations, for example in the naming of some strategies as 'public engagement', but the main thrust of the argument is clear and it is shared: the old,

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“…While there has been a small amount of other discussion examining the importance and efficacy of policy-informing dialogue events (Durodié, 2003;Jackson et al, 2005;Llewellyn, 2005;, dialogue events that do not seek to inform public policy are undertheorized and under-researched in regard to their nature and effectiveness, even though they are common and growing in popularity in both the UK and US.…”

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confidence: 99%

Discussing dialogue: perspectives on the value of science dialogue events that do not inform policy

McCallie²,

et al. 2008

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While theoretical work and empirical research have examined science policyinforming "dialogue events," dialogue events that do not seek to inform public policy are under-theorized and under-researched, even though they are common and growing in popularity in the UK. We describe how, from a critical perspective, it may initially appear that such events cannot be justified without returning to the deficit model. But with this paper, we seek to open up a discussion about these non policy-informing events by arguing that there are in fact further ways to understand and frame them. We deliberately draw on different literatures and seek to make use of practitioner expertise within our discussion, in order to display several perspectives on the value of non-policy dialogue on science as sites of symmetrical individual or small-scale learning-rather than institutional learning-through social processes.

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Strengths of Public Dialogue on Science‐related Issues

Cited by 49 publications

References 8 publications

Ethnographic Invention: Probing the Capacity of Laboratory Decisions

Ethnographic Invention: Probing the Capacity of Laboratory Decisions

Towards an Analytical Framework of Science Communication Models

Discussing dialogue: perspectives on the value of science dialogue events that do not inform policy

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