ESHS/HSS Annual Meeting

Activism by Design: How Scientific Instruments Shape Democratization in Citizen Science

• In Event: Activist Epistemics and Artefacts 3

English Abstract

Citizen science is often described as a form of “activist science,” largely because many initiatives claim outcomes that extend beyond knowledge production: greater democratization of science, improved scientific literacy, or data capable of protecting biodiversity and exposing pollution. Yet what ‘activism’ actually means in this context and how it relates to ‘democratization’ remains unclear. The central question of this presentation is: What forms can activism take in citizen science, and how do different sociotechnical configurations shape the kinds of democratization they make possible? To address this question, I compare two contrasting cases. The first is the PlanktoScope, a microscope developed with the ambition of democratizing access to plankton observation and enabling citizens to act as guardians of ocean health. Its trajectory—from a FabLab in Brittany, through a period of development in Manu Prakash’s laboratory at Stanford, to its commercialization via the FairScope start-up— illustrates how an instrument initially conceived as frugal and widely accessible encounters practical, technical, and institutional constraints. These frictions expose the tensions faced by projects that position themselves outside conventional scientific institutions yet remain embedded in broader neoliberal infrastructures. The second case, Open Source Estrogen, rooted in hacker-space culture, seeks to provide participants with protocols for extracting estrogen from their own urine using everyday tools and the kitchen as a laboratory. Here, activism takes the form of reclaiming bodily autonomy and subverting existing biomedical frameworks, enabling participants to produce and manage hormonal knowledge outside institutional structures. This comparison of two initiatives allows me to interrogate how scientific instruments mediate access to knowledge, shape community practices, and ultimately redefine what counts as ‘democratizing’ science.

Author

• Evan Josselin, Institut Jean Nicod – ENS/CNRS