New Multiples in STI policy? Understanding the entanglement of concepts, practices and identities

Abstract

In the wake of incessant reforms pertaining to the role and function of science, technology and innovation (STI) in society, the 21st century has seen a multiplication of new STI concepts, some of which are challenging the seemingly stable understandings, practices and conceptions of scientific knowledge production and their technological utilization. How do these new concepts, e.g. responsible research and innovation, grand/societal challenges, frontier research, translational research, science diplomacy, mission-oriented research and innovation, emerge? (How) do they relate to each other, and what narratives are they embedded in? What and who are their drivers? How and by whom does their articulation take place, rather top-down or bottom-up? Whom do they include and exclude and when? Do they just legitimize policymakers or (when and why) do they translate into practices and identities of actors from the science system. How are they different from ‘old’ concepts that bridged or delineated science and non-science? This panel invites contributions that assess the role and interrelation of new STI concepts and is open to single case studies, comparative conceptual works, longitudinal analyses that put new concepts in historical perspective as well as studies that investigate into practice and habitus formations in relation to new concepts.

Chairs

• Cornelia Schendzielorz, Deutsches Insitut für Wissenschafts und Hochschulforschung/Humboldt Universität zu Berlin

• Martin Reinhart, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin

Discussant

• Tim Flink, Humboldt-Universitat zu Berlin

Individual Presentations

• Interdisciplinary Research and Problem Solving: Analysing European Policy Discourses - Isabel Fletcher, Science, Technology and Innovation Studies, The University of Edinburgh; Bianca Vienni Baptista, ETH Zürich

• On the Origins of Research Funding Instruments: the Institutional Emergence of Strategic Research - Susanna Vase, University of Helsinki

• Public Engagement In STI Co-operation: Discussions On Potential Implementations In Turkey - yagmur yildiz, Middle East Technical University Science and Technology Policy Studies

• Research for Development - A concept and border issue between science and development politics - Stefan Skupien, WZB Berlin Social Science Center

Session Organizer

• Barbara Hendriks, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin and German Centre for Higher Education Research and Science Studies