Nanotechnology - Nanotech Regulatory Document Archive - Arizona ...

Nano S&T and Society: Discussing the Engagement of Social Scientists
Philippe Larédo
Universities of Paris-Est and Manchester
Presentation to the session ‘societal engagement’
Third International Dialogue on Responsible Research and Development of Nanotechnology
Brussels, March 11-12
I have been asked to present you “a case study” about the global networking of social
scientists
I must say the issue surprised me. It thus drove me to inquire about the involvement of social
scientists in such arena for dialogue.
I thus did a small review of the previous meetings and I also screened some recent workshops
like these of Helsinki and Brussels on safety.
I was struck by three aspects : (a) there was a significant involvement of non-governmental
organisations, (b) there has been quite strong reliance of polls and surveys to speak about
future markets or public attitudes or perceptions, and (c) they were very few social scientists
involved, and when this was the case, they were less presenting and discussing research
results, than accounting for their activity as ‘social engineers’, for instance in developing
consensus conferences, focus groups, juries, constructive technology assessments, and other
forms of public inquiries.
This reinforced my interrogation: why would one ask, in a session on societal engagement,
social scientists to speak about the way social scientists work and network? And not about the
issues raised and how they address them, including needs for cooperation and ‘global
networking’. Furthermore, for doing, social scientists heavily rely on public funding, and this
raises the question of how public programmes include these aspects, and in particular
nanotechnology programmes which all include risk and safety dimensions as well as social,
ethical and legal dimensions.
For doing this, I have chosen to take the example of one programme, the European
Commission one, summarise the main issues it raised and then try and see what has been done
and is being done by social scientists and how (and also what is not being done). This will
drive me to suggest that programmes have mostly addressed the issue of mobilising social
187