The Cultural Meaning of Regulatory Science: The Shifting Role of Public Health Under Reagan and Trump

• In Event: 40858 - The Politics of Science Today

Abstract

Understanding the historical trajectory of regulatory science is critical for evaluating the role of scientific agencies in policy making. The entanglement of deregulation and politicization weakens governance, erodes public trust, and poses challenges to democratic norms (Freeman & Jacobs 2021; Tunstall 1985). This study compares two historical periods of deregulation under two Presidential administrations (Reagan and Trump 1) to understand broad changes to the norms of regulatory science and science-based policies (McGarity & Wagner 2019; Oreskes & Conway 2022). Using a qualitative analyses of U.S. Congressional hearings from 1983 to 1987 and 2020 to 2024, this study investigates regulatory capture and elite fragmentation of the administrative state in these two epochs. The focus of this analysis centers on the institutions of regulatory science, examining their evolution over time, the key transformations they have undergone during periods of deregulation, their present state, and their future horizon.

Author

• Pauline Brown, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee