*****with apologies for cross-posting********


    CALL FOR PAPERS

SESSION: Experts in the Periphery:

Governing Techno-sciences
and Societies from the 19th to the 21st centuries

Lisbon, 1-3
September 2014: http://step2014.ciuhct.com/callforpapers.html





Coordinators

Stathis Arapostathis,
University of Athens  <[log in to unmask]>

Jose Ramon
Bertomeu, Valencia University <[log in to unmask]>



Introduction

In recent years an increasing number of studies in history of science have
focused on the definition and the role of experts in modern western
societies, where expert advice is broadly employed in the fight against
the disease, the prosecution of criminal activities, the development of
military industry, the control of food quality and the regulation of
industry, among many others.  General books with reviews and theoretical
proposals have been published (Golan, 2004; Collins-Evans, 2007) and the
interest in the subject is easily perceived by the growing number of
publications that have appeared in history of science journals (Social
Studies of Science, for instance), the Isis focus on "Science and Law"
(2007) and the more recent volume Forensic Cultures (2013), a special
issue of Studies in the History and Philosophy of the Biological and
Biomedical Sciences. Some of these publications and collective volumes
were conceived or discussed in international workshops organized in
Oxford, (October, 2005), Philadelphia (April 2006), Hull (September 2009),
Manchester (June 2010), as well as the STEP workshops in Valencia
(December 2011) and in Corfu (June 2012, 8th STEP meeting).

Recent
approaches in the role of experts in the making of sciences and technologies
have shown and argued in favor of an understanding of the experts’
functions as mediators either between the general public and the
government (regional, national, international) or between the public and
the corporate and Industrial world. In more sociological terminology we
would say that the experts are actors with hybrid epistemological,
cognitive and social identity pertinent and flexible enough to be able to
form and shape ‘trading zones’ where new knowledge, policies and social
roles are formed. New historiographical and sociological studies have
stressed that mediating actors form regimes of scientific and
technological knowledge pertinent to the policy making procedure. An
epistemological genre called ‘civic epistemology’ is emerging through the
agency of historical actors like experts. Experts self-fashion the
role of intermediaries between power and people and thus in many cases
represented their practice and their communities as substantially
important in the construction of a stable, modest and consensual society.
Yet still the historical works have stressed the performative dimension of
the function and role of the techno-scientific professionals as well as
its precarious Social and epistemological status. Emphasis has been given
in the co-construction of society, regional society, communities and
techno-sciences and techno-scientific politics and policies.

General Research Questions of the Session

How experts did function in local and institutional settings and
contributed in the appropriation of techno-sciences in European
peripheries? What was the role of techno-scientific experts in governing
technologies and sciences in the making? How the politics of expertise was
experienced in different and multiple settings? How expert networks and
techno-scientific expertise were shaped within local contexts and
different cultures of social distinctions and social hierarchy?



List of Topics (not exclusive)

Institutions and politics of expertise

Environment,society and the experts

Making the boundaries Lay/ Expert

Technologies of governance and experts

Forensic cultures in context

Expertise and knowledge management

Regulating chemicals, drugs and food

Managing uncertainty, creating ignorance

Making international standards

Politics of risk and fear

Expert controversies in the public arena



Deadlines for Abstracts and Sessions submission



Abstract
submission to the organizers of the session – 3 January 2014

Session proposals submission – 10 January 2014



Decision to
the authors (accepted sessions) – 10 February 2014

Submission
of pre-circulated papers – 30 June 2014

Meeting:
1-3 September 2014.



All the
submissions of paper abstracts for the session should be addressed to both
organizers.

For any
enquiries please contact the session organizers.





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-- 
Stathis Arapostathis
Lecturer in the History of Science and Technology
Department of Philosophy and History of Science
National and Kapodistrian University of Athens
University Campus
Ilissia
Athens 15771
Greece
Email. [log in to unmask]
Tel. +30 210 7275583

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