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Science of Science and Reflexivity
01 Jan 2004-
TL;DR: Bourdieu's "Science of Science and Reflexivity" as mentioned in this paper argues that science is in danger of becoming a handmaiden to biotechnology, medicine, genetic engineering, and military research that it risks falling under the control of industrial corporations that seek to exploit it for monopolies and profit.
Abstract: Over the last four decades, the French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu produced one of the most imaginative and subtle bodies of social theory of the postwar era. When he died in 2002, he was considered to be a thinker on a par with Foucault, Barthes, and Lacan a public intellectual as influential to his generation as Sartre was to his. "Science of Science and Reflexivity" will be welcomed as a companion volume to Bourdieu's now seminal "An Invitation to Reflexive Sociology." In this posthumous work, Bourdieu declares that science is in danger of becoming a handmaiden to biotechnology, medicine, genetic engineering, and military research that it risks falling under the control of industrial corporations that seek to exploit it for monopolies and profit. Science thus endangered can become detrimental to mankind. The line between pure and applied science, therefore, must be subjected to intense theoretical scrutiny. Bourdieu's goals in "Science of Science and Reflexivity" are to identify the social conditions in which science develops in order to reclaim its objectivity and to rescue it from relativism and the forces that might exploit it. In the grand tradition of scientific reflections on science, Bourdieu provides a sociological analysis of the discipline as something capable of producing transhistorical truths; he presents an incisive critique of the main currents in the study of science throughout the past half century; and he offers a spirited defense of science against encroaching political and economic forces. A masterful summation of the principles underlying Bourdieu's oeuvre and a memoir of his own scientific journey, "Science of Science and Reflexivity" is a capstone to one of the most important and prodigious careers in the field of sociology."
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01 Jan 2019
TL;DR: In today's world, economists are not only academic specialists of economic behaviour but have turned into public and media mediated authorities that shape what political and other social agents know about the world as discussed by the authors.
Abstract: In today’s world, economists are not only academic specialists of economic behaviour but have turned into public and media mediated authorities that shape what political and other social agents know about the world (Maese 2015a). The ivory tower may still function as their home and powerbase, but their scope of action is global and their expertise has performative effects on the whole of society (MacKenzie 2007). Economic ideas and concepts structure how we see human behaviour and social life, how we think we could and should influence it and to what purpose (Vogl 2010).
01 Jan 2022
TL;DR: In this paper, a social contract between science and society has developed since 1945 and three time periods, but they distinguish slightly different time periods may be preferred, based on the perspective taken.
Abstract: Science in the recent past promised to society to contribute to the grand challenges of the United Nations, UNESCO, WHO, the EU agenda and national agendas for change and improvement of our life, the human condition. In this chapter it will be briefly discussed how this social contract between science and society has developed since 1945. In the context of this book I distinguish three time periods, but I do realize slightly different time periods may be preferred, based on the perspective taken. The first phase from 1945 till 1960 is characterized by autonomy, building on the successes of the natural sciences and engineering in World War II. In the second phase, the late sixties till approximately 1980, government and the public lost trust and saw the downside of science and technology. The response from politics and the public was to call for societal and political responsible research inspired by broader socio-political developments in society. The third phase from 1990 till 2010 was one of renewed enthusiasm and hope that science and technology would bring economic growth, which should make nations internationally competitive. There increasingly was also room for societal problems related to environment and sustainability, health and well-being. In this approach of the so-called knowledge economy, with the world-wide embracing of neoliberal politics, strong relations with government and the private sector were established. This was accompanied by short-term accountability, control from government and funders at the level of project output, using accordingly defined metrics and indicators. Because of this, this model became firmly and globally institutionalized.
25 May 2022
TL;DR: In this article , the authors investigated the relationship between aspirations and positive attitudes to individual curriculum subjects and found that there is little relationship between them and positive attitude towards individual curriculum subject, while out-of-school activities and the links to aspirations in engineering are discussed.
Abstract: ABSTRACT Across Europe, there is concern about the number and diversity of pupils taking study routes leading to Engineering. There is growing evidence that these career choices begin to form at elementary school age (Moote et al., 2020). Science, maths and design and technology are seen as subject choices necessary for pupils’ progression into science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) related occupations. Achievement in these subjects, identity, gender attitudes to the subjects, parents and informal activities may have an impact on these career choices. This mixed methods research draws on participants in the Children as Engineers project to investigate aspirations to a career in engineering and the links between these aspirations and attitudes to STEM subjects. It explores findings that suggest that there is little relationship between aspirations and positive attitudes to individual curriculum subjects. Pupils’ out-of-school activities and the links to aspirations in engineering are also researched and discussed. The article discusses the pupils’ rationales for these choices and the implications for intervention and informal engineering experiences that rely on a science and maths context for elementary school activities and for fostering interest in engineering.