Book•
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."
Citations
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22 Jul 2014
TL;DR: The authors evaluate F&M's theory of field transformation by comparing it with Berman's (2012a) field-based explanation of the changes in the field of US academic science, which saw no such field-level struggles and suggests that tools are also needed for explaining new settlements that do not result from intentional efforts to establish them.
Abstract: Field theory is one of the most visible approaches in the new political sociology of science, and Fligstein & McAdam’s (F&M) Theory of Fields is the most visible recent attempt to further it. This paper evaluates F&M’s theory of field transformation by comparing it with Berman’s (2012a) field-based explanation of the changes in the field of US academic science. While F&M’s general framework is quite useful, their explanation, which focuses on struggles between incumbents and challengers over whose conception of the field should dominate, does not map neatly onto the changes in academic science, which saw no such field-level struggles. This suggests that tools are also needed for explaining new settlements that do not result from intentional efforts to establish them. In particular, the case of US academic science shows that local innovations with practices based on alternative conceptions of the field can lead to field-level change. Attention to the interaction between local practice innovations and larger environments provides insights into how change ripples across fields, as well as the ongoing contention and dynamism within even relatively stable fields.
14 citations
TL;DR: In this article, a large-scale bibliographic study conducted based on the citation practices within the field of research on adult learning is presented, showing that sociocultural perspectives on learning occupy a very central position in the space of citations, balancing between these opposing poles.
Abstract: In this article we report on findings from a large-scale bibliographic study conducted based on the citation practices within the field of research on adult learning. Our data consist of 151,261 citation links between more than 33,000 different authors whose papers were published in five leading international journals in the field of adult learning during the time period 2006–2014. By analysing the composition of the dominating citation clusters we are able to construct a telescopic view of the research field based on an accumulation of bibliographic citations. The results consist of two parts. First we go through the dominating players active in the field, their position and mutual relationship. Secondly, we derive two main structural oppositions inherent in the citation networks, one connected to the research object (studying education or work) and the second to the level of analysis (cognition or policy). We find that the most dominating tradition within adult learning the last few decades – sociocultural perspectives on learning - occupies a very central position in the space of citations, balancing between these opposing poles. We hope that this analysis will help foster reflexivity concerning our own research practices, and will reveal the relations of dominance currently prevailing within the field of adult learning.
14 citations
Cites background from "Science of Science and Reflexivity"
...…field in its own right within which symbolic forms of recognition are simultaneously sought after and agreed upon through research practices (Bourdieu 1985, 2004; Bourdieu and Wacquant 1992).2 Our first research question concerns whom in the field is attributed scholarly value based on the…...
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DOI•
14 Jan 2013TL;DR: In this paper, the authors introduce the concept of the subordinating object to understand how knowledge produced in metropolitan centers is appropriated in peripheral fields, and derive from qualitative research and the analysis of documents on academic trajectories and theoretical influence.
Abstract: In social studies on science andtechnology, abundant literature has emerged on the importance of space in the production and thecirculation of knowledge. The very idea ofthe circulation of knowledge has received more attention, particularly because of the need to analyze the transformations it undergoes as it travels from its place of origin to its multiple destinations. This article, derived from qualitative research and the analysis of documents on academic trajectories and theoretical influence, introduces the concept of the “subordinating object” to understand how knowledge produced in metropolitan centers is appropriated in peripheral fields.D. R.
14 citations
01 Jan 2015
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors propose a method to solve the problem of "uniformity" and "uncertainty" in the context of health care, and propose a solution.
Abstract: xiii
14 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors studied the career trajectories of economics and business studies professors in Switzerland between 1957 and 2000, focusing on the accumulation and conversion of capitals during academic trajectories, and their relation to scientific reputation, network relations, and internationality.
Abstract: This paper studies the different biographic pathways to an economics and business studies professor position between 1957 and 2000 on the specific case of Switzerland. It focuses on the accumulation and conversion of capitals during academic trajectories, and their relation to three types of resources: scientific reputation, network relations, and internationality. Based on an original biographical database of 411 professors and an innovative use of sequence analysis and multinomial logistic regression, it shows that the three main principles of career structuration divide them between (1) academic and extra-academic trajectories, (2) “standard” positions and executive positions in influent academic organizations, and (3) according to the timing of the accession to a professor position (“early” vs. “slower” appointments). It also shows that careers are increasingly academic between 1957 and 2000. Academic only and long full professor trajectories are linked to reputation in the scientific field (through citations in “prestigious” journals) and internationality of the professors’ profile, while an earlier appointment as professor is associated to developed scientific collaboration networks. Relatively long careers in executive positions in influent academic organizations are linked to important connections to economic, political, and administrative “elite” members (through the supervision of their PhD) as well as scientific expertise for the state, while extra-academic careers only lead to subordinate (associate) professor positions and no detention of other resources within economics and business studies whatsoever.
14 citations