Transcript ofz_master_3 - National Centre for Research on Europe

Communicating Science and Technology:
Education and Empowerment
Bernhard Wieser
Presentation
IFF/IFZ
Schlögelgasse 2
A-8010 Graz
[email protected]
www.ifz.tugraz.at
Education as Critical Reflection:
On Opportunities of Participation in
Genetic Engineering
Technologies, Publics and Power
Akaroa/New Zealand, 1.-5. Februar 2004
18/07/2015
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Overview
 Starting point
 Framing
 Alternative approaches
 Continuing Education
 Alternative Framing
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Main Thesis
Starting point
Framing
 Socially sound Science through participation:
 Participation in shaping processes
Alternative
approaches
 Participation in decisions making processes
Continuing
Education
 Science communication is not sufficient, but
necessary for participation
Alternative Framing
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3
Central Question
Starting point
Framing
Alternative
approaches
 How can science communication be organized in
such a way that more participation is possible?
 Concrete: how to encounter the deficit-model in
science communication?
Continuing
Education
Alternative Framing
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GMO Controversy
as a refence point
Starting point
Framing
Alternative
approaches
Continuing
Education
 Causes a wave of science communication activities
 Science communication as conflict resolution
 Communication with a focus on acceptance
problems
Alternative Framing
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Framing
of the science – public relation
Starting point
Framing
Alternative
approaches
Continuing
Education
Alternative Framing
18/07/2015
 A lack of public acceptance is explained as a result
of an information and knowledge deficit
„Many information campaigns implicitly assume that
reservations against genetic engineering are a result of
knowledge deficits. According to this assumption there
would be no rejection if all people knew what genetic
engineers know” (Hampel/Renn 1999, S. 387).
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Knowledge and Acceptance
a controversial relation
Starting point
Framing
Alternative
approaches
Continuing
Education
Alternative Framing
 Knowledge and acceptance correlate
 Eurobarometer 46.1
 Kelley 1995
 Knowledge and acceptance don’t correlate
 Hampel/Renn 1999
 Weingart 2001
 Wynne 1995
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Deficit-Model
critiques based on epistemological or democratic
arguments (Durant 1999)
Starting point
Framing
Alternative
approaches
Continuing
Education
Alternative Framing
 Science is unproblematic: provides safe, certain and
conclusive knowledge
 The public is perceived negatively: lay persons lack
expert knowledge
 Disturbances: the relation to the public is
characterized by ignorance and misunderstandings
 Undemocratic hierarchy between those who know
and those who don’t know: exclusion from
participation in decision making processes
 One-way-communication
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Alternative Approaches
Starting point for an improved science communication
Starting point
Framing
Alternative
approaches
Continuing
Education
 Significant life experiences
 Meaning in everyday context
 Obvious relevance for action
 Interactive communication
Alternative Framing
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Challanges
for a practical implementation
Starting point
Framing
Alternative
approaches
Continuing
Education
Alternative Framing
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 In which contexts can a relationship to everyday life,
orientation towards experience, relevance for action
and interactivity be ensured?
 Which situations of communication?
 Which learning processes?
 Which settings?
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Approach
continuing education (vocational training)
Starting point
Framing
Alternative
approaches
Continuing Education
Alternative Framing
 Work
 has a quality of everyday experience
 is action oriented
 Continuing education
 seminars in small and medium settings allow
interactive communication
 Target groups
 groups from professions that are confronted with
genetic engineering
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Action-relevant Knowledge
countering the deficit-model and moving beyond it
Starting point
Framing
Alternative
approaches
Continuing
Education
Alternative Framing
 Referring to job-related action contexts
 Upgrading and acknowledging practice knowledge,
local knowledge, extending communication to nonscientific aspects
 Broadening the notion of Knowledge
 Alternative understandings of science (scientific
knowledge is provisional, controversial, local and
context dependant, too)
 No hierarchy between scientific and action related
knowledge
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Alternative Framing
of the science – public relationship
Starting point
Framing
Alternative
approaches
Continuing
Education
Alternative Framing
 A relationship is necessary and helpful
 to allow an assessment of the non-scientific aspects
of scientific knowledge
 to develop strategies for a socially sound practice in
applying scientific knowledge (democratisation
instead of expertocracy); knowledge and acceptance
don’t correlate
 Significance of interactive communication processes
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Literatur

Durant, John: Public understanding. Participatory technology assessment and the
democratic model of the public understanding of science. In: Science and Public Policy.
October 1999, pp. 313-319
IFF/IFZ
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Schlögelgasse 2
A-8010 Graz
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Eurobarometer 46.1: The Europeans and Modern Biotechnology. European
Commission, Brussels – Luxembourg 1997
Hampel, Jürgen and Ortwin Renn (Eds.): Gentechnik in der Öffentlichkeit.
Wahrnehmung und Bewertung einer umstrittenen Technologie, Frankfurt/New York,
Campus 1999
Kelley, Jonathan:Public Perceptions of Genetic Engineering: Australia, 1994.
International Social Science Survey. Department of Industrie, Science and Technology
1995, pp. 7-12
Nowotny, Helga: Vorwort. In: Heintz, Bettina/Nievergelt, Bernhard;
Wissenschaftsforschung und Technikforschung in der Schweiz. Sondierung einer
neuen Disziplin. Zürich, Seismo Verlag 1998
Nelkin, Dorothy: Science Controversies. The Dynamics of Public Disputes in the United
States. In: Jasanoff, Sheila et al. [Ed‘s.]: Handbook of Science and Technology Studies.
Thousand Oaks/London/New Delhi, Sage Publications 1995, pp. 444-456
Weingart, Peter: Die Stunde der Wahrheit. Zum Verhältnis der Wissenschaft zu Politik,
Wirtschaft und Medien in der Wissensgesellschaft. Weilerswist, Velbrück Wissenschaft
2001
Wynne, Bryan: Public Understanding of Science. In: Jasanoff, Sheila et al. [Ed‘s.]:
Handbook of Science and Technology Studies. Thousand Oaks/London/New Delhi,
Sage Publications 1995, pp.361-388
Bernhard Wieser
[email protected]
www.ifz.tugraz.at
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