Citizen Engagement with Emerging Technologies
STS 6674 (CRN 62316)
Summer 2012, Wednesdays 7-9:45 PM
Room TBA (Falls Church)
Instructor: David Tomblin
Contact:
Office Hours: by appointment
This course focuses on the future! We will investigate the increasingly complex interface between technoscience and society induced by the emergence of a number of technologies that challenge what it means to be human. Right before our eyes (and sometimes beyond the scope of the human senses) the social and biological world is becoming integrated with a multitude of nested and interacting complex techno-scientific systems that are difficult to understand and predict as a whole. What will a world inundated with the applications of synthetic biology, nanotechnologies, geoengineering, GMOs, human enhancement technologies, artificial intelligence, alternative energies, pharmacogenetics, and robotic devices look like? How should such a techno-scientific landscape be governed? Who should be part of the decision making processes concerning the implementation of these technologies? What is the origin of the numerous controversies that play a role in sorting out issues concerning some emerging technologies? As we explore the social, political, cultural, ethical, and environmental dimensions of numerous emerging technologies, we will also critically examine recent STS theoretical and policy interventions that aim to address these pressing questions: anticipatory governance, the public understanding of science and technology, assessments of meaningful citizen engagement, participatory technology assessments, the role of expertise in a democratic society, new political sociology of science, actor network theory, and user-technology relationships.
Course Readings (Required Texts): You need to procure the following books. Additional readings will be posted on Scholar.
Braden Allenby and Daniel Sarewitz. The Techno-human Condition (Cambride, MA: The MIT Press, 2011).
Michel Callon, Pierre Lascoumes, and Yannick Barthe. Acting in an Uncertain World: An Essay on Technical Democracy (Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2009).
Sheila Jasanoff. Designs on Nature: Science and Democracy in Europe and the United States (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2007).
Note: I reserve the right to change readings on the syllabus. I promise that we will use all the books I asked you to purchase. If changes occur, it will be with the assigned articles. At the latest, I will announce these changes the week before they are due.
Student Responsibilities and Class Format:
The bulk of the course will involve instructor facilitated discussion or student-driven discussion. However, occasionally I will deliver brief lectures that cover necessary background information left out of the readings. I encourage you to ask questions and bring your own experiences, concerns, and biases into the course dialogue. Your final grade is based on your performance in the responsibilities outlined below:
Participation (30%): I expect you to regularly attend classes and carefully read each week’s assigned readings. You should at least be familiar enough with the material to participate in discussions. All interactions with your peers should be conducted in a professional manner. Please engage the ideas of your peers and instructor critically, but respectfully. This grade is based on a variety of activities, which include class discussion, student-led instruction sessions, careful reading, and attendance.
STS Tools and Current Events (20%): Each student is responsible for presenting a brief STS analysis of a current S&T issue related to emerging technologies of your choosing, with the caveat that the topic can’t be on what you are doing for your class research project. The week you are assigned to do this task, I want you to search through newspapers or popular magazines for a relevant topic and post it on Scholar. It need not be a long article (shorter the better). For class, propose an STS concept that you think might help analyze the issue at a deeper level. Create a 10 minute lecture that summarizes the issue as presented in the article and outlines your proposed STS analysis. After that, I want you to facilitate a 20 minute discussion with your peers.
Semester-long Research Project (50%): You will produce an original scholarly work of 15-20 pages that uses an STS conceptual framework to explore the relationship between citizen engagement and an emerging technology. You are free to choose a topic that helps you complete your thesis work or helps you think about your own research in a different way. I will ask you to produce an oral presentation of a proposal during the middle weeks of the class and complete a final draft by exam week. I will explain in more detail the purpose and preferred format of each of these assignments in class.
Course Schedule
Week 1 (May 23) – Why Study and Encourage Citizen Engagement with Emerging Techno-sciences?
Kelly Moore,”Powered by the People: Scientific Authority in Participatory Science,” in The New Political Sociology of Science, Scott Frickel and Kelly Moore, eds. (Madison: The University of Wisconsin Press, 2006): 299-323. (Scholar)
Stephen Epstein, “Institutionalizing the New Politics of Difference in U.S. Biomedical Research: Thinking across the Science/State/Society Divides,” in The New Political Sociology of Science, Scott Frickel and Kelly Moore, eds. (Madison: The University of Wisconsin Press, 2006): 327-350. (Scholar)
Week 2 (May 30) – How Should We Deal with Socio-technical Complexity?
Braden Allenby and Daniel Sarewitz. The Techno-human Condition (MIT Press, 2011).
Week 3 (June 6) – Co-production
Sheila Jasanoff. Designs on Nature: Science and Democracy in Europe and the United States (Princeton University Press, 2007)
Week 4 (June 13) – Actor Network Theory, Uncertainty, and Democracy
Michel Callon, Pierre Lascoumes, and Yannick Barthe. Acting in an Uncertain World: An Essay on Technical Democracy (Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2009).
Week 5 (June 20) – Global Governance?
Dominique Pestre (2008). “Challenges for the Democratic Management of Technoscience: Governance, Participation and the Political Today” Science as Culture 17 (2): 101–119. (Scholar)
Jason Blackstock and Jane Long, “The Politics of Geoengineering,” Science (29 January 2010): 527. (Scholar)
Clark A. Miller, Soapbox (CSPO, ASU): “The Human Subjects of Geoengineering” and “International Review of Geoengineering,” March 11 & 19, 2010 (Scholar)
URL: http://www.cspo.org/soapbox/view/100311P9IA/the-human-subjects-of-geoengineering/
Daniel Strain, “Public Awareness of Geoengineering Increasing” Science Insider (October 2011): URL: http://news.sciencemag.org/scienceinsider/2011/10/public-awareness-of-geoengineering.html (Scholar)
Braden Allenby, “A Critique of Geo-engineering,” IEEE Potentials (January/February 2012): 22-26. (Scholar)
Week 6 (June 27) – Anticipatory Governance
Risto Karinen and David Guston, “Toward Anticipatory Governance: Experience with Nanotechnology,” in Governing Future Technologies, Kaiser et al., eds. (Springer, 2009). (Scholar)
Davies, S. R., & Selin, C. (2012). Energy Futures: Five Dilemmas of the Practice of Anticipatory Governance. Environmental Communication, 6(1), 119-136. (Scholar)
Week 7 (July 4) – Public Understanding of S&T (I): Engaging and Shaping Citizens
Maria Powell et al., “Imagining Ordinary Citizens? Conceptualized and Actual Participants for Deliberations on Emerging Technologies,” Science as Culture 20 (2011): 37-70. (Scholar)
Maja Horst and Alan Irwin, “Nations at Ease with Radical Knowledge: On Consensus, Consensusing and False Consensusness,” Social Studies of Science 40 (2010): 105-126. (Scholar)
David Guston, "Participating Despite Questions: Toward a More Confident Participatory Technology Assessment," Science and Engineering Ethics 17(2011): 691-697. (Scholar)
Sheila Jasanoff, “Constitutional Moments in Governing Science and Technology,” Science and Engineering Ethics 17(2011): 621-638. (Scholar)
Sergio Sismondo, “Public Understanding of Science” in An Introduction to Science and Technology Studies (optional background) (Scholar)
Week 8 (July 11) – Public Understanding of S&T (II): Assessing Technology Acceptance
Nidhi Gupta et al., “Socio-psychological determinants of public acceptance of technologies: a review,” Public Understanding of Science (Open Access -2011): 1-14. (Scholar)
Andrew Binder et al., “Measuring risk/benefit perceptions of emerging technologies and their potential impact on communication of public opinion toward science,” Public Understanding of Science (Open Access - 2010): 1-18. (Scholar)
Daniel Barden, “Analyzing acceptance politics: Towards an epistemological shift in the public understanding of science and technology,” Public Understanding of Science 19 (2010): 274-292. (Scholar)
Linda Hogle, “Pragmatic Objectivity and the Standardization of Engineered Tissues,” Social Studies of Science 39 (2009): 717-742. (Scholar)
Week 9 (July 18) – Public Understanding of S&T (III): The Origins of Controversy
Issue on Synthetic Bio from Public Understanding of Science 21/2 (2012): 4 articles (Scholar)
Week 10 (July 25) – Public Understanding of S&T (IV): Media
Sarah Kaplan and Joanna Radan, “Bounding an Emerging Technology: Para-scientific media and the Drexler-Smalley Debate about Nanotechnology, Social Studies of Science 41 (2011): 457-485. (Scholar)
David Kirby, “Diegetic Prototypes and the Role of Popular Films in Generating Real-world Technological Development,” Social Studies of Science 40 (2010): 41–70. (Scholar)
Angela Cassidy, “Evolutionary psychology as public science and boundary work,” Public Understanding Science 15 (2006): 175–205. (Scholar)
Week 11 (August 1) – Technology/User Relationships
Nelly Oudshoorn and Trevor Pinch (2008). “User-Technology Relationships: Some Recent Developments,” in The Handbook of Science and Technology Studies, 3rd edition, edited by Hackett, Amsterdamska, Lynch, and Wajcman (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press), pp. 542-565. (Scholar)
Phillipe Ross, “Problematizing the user in user-centered production: A new media lab meets its audience,” Social Studies of Science 41 (2011): 251-270. (Scholar)
Jaap Jelsma, “Designing ‘Moralized’ Products,” in User Behavior and Technology Development,Peter-Paul Verbeek and Adriaan Slob, eds. (Springer, 2006): 221-231. (Scholar)
Dean Nieusma, “Alternative Design Scholarship: Working Toward Appropriate Design,” Design Issues 20(3): 13-24. (Scholar)
Week 12 (August 8) – The Military Model of Innovation
Daniel Sarewitz and Daniel Thermstrom. Energy Innovation at the Department of Defense: Assessing the Opportunities (CSPO: 2012).
Final Paper due Exam Week (August 11 – This is negotiable)
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