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Toward Anticipatory Governance: The Experience with Nanotechnology

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Governing Future Technologies

Part of the book series: Sociology of the Sciences Yearbook ((SOSC,volume 27))

Abstract

This volume argues that the emergence and institutionalization of nanotechnologies can only be fully grasped with respect to the ways contemporary reflections and deliberations contextualize them as future technologies. Because nanotechnologies are currently inchoate, even those stakeholders who recognize an interest in them often operate with only loosely formed and sometimes ill-conceived expectations of them. Even so, such projections are essential resources in legitimating and authorizing decision-making. In debates on nanotechnology, the future is “an active arena, one both pregnant and populated with agendas, interests and contestations” (Selin 2007: 214).

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Notes

  1. 1.

    http://www.nano.gov/html/about/funding.html (accessed on August 13, 2008).

  2. 2.

    According to the Wilson Center Project on Emerging Nanotechnologies. http://www.nanotechproject.org/44 (accessed on June 19, 2009).

  3. 3.

    Among the most influenced works were empirical studies of budgeting (e.g. Wildavsky 1984) and the relationship between agendas and policy change (e.g. Kingdon 1995), as well as normative studies of policy change (e.g. Gilmour 1995).

  4. 4.

    The Steelman (1947) report, the more liberal and social scientific counterpart to the establishment Bush report, quoted a National Academy of Sciences report from the pre-war period advocating collaborations between natural and social scientists.

  5. 5.

    And none of the early awards, including Rosalyn Berne’s ethics work (Berne 2006), the nano-STS work at University of South Carolina or the technology transfer work at UCLA, was aimed at intervention rather than description.

  6. 6.

    See The National Nanotechnology Initiative: Research and Development Leading to a Revolution in Technology and Industry, Supplement to the President’s FY 2007 Budget. http://www.nano.gov/NNI_07Budget.pdf (accessed on January 27, 2008).

  7. 7.

    See National Nanotechnology Initiative: FY 2009 Budget and Highlights, http://www.nano.gov/NNI_FY09_budget_summary.pdf (accessed on August 13, 2008).

  8. 8.

    Roco (2006) and Kuzma (2007) use the term but are not found on Google Scholar search; their usage seems directly derived from Guston and Sarewitz (2002).

  9. 9.

    There are still deeper roots for the concept of anticipation in connection with governance, and while we agree with an anonymous reviewer’s comment that there are “non-trivial chunks of sociology of science, expertise, “triple helix” and commercialization, public understanding of science”, etc., that contribute to anticipatory governance (indeed, see Guston and Sarewitz 2002), there are still more direct lineages from Toffler (1970), his description of “anticipatory democracy”, and follow-on literatures.

  10. 10.

    Personal communication with the authors: January 2, 2008.

  11. 11.

    As one such reflexive activity, in October 2008 CNS-ASU conducted a “visioning workshop” to assess plausible future trajectories across twenty years of anticipatory governance as a social technology (Selin 2008b).

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Acknowledgments

Support for this chapter provided in part by the US National Science Foundation cooperative agreement # 0531194. Any findings, conclusions, or opinions are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the National Science Foundation.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Arizona State University, Center for Nanotechnology in Society, 85287-5603, Tempe, AZ, USA

    Risto Karinen Ph.D. & David H. Guston (Professor Dr.)

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  1. Risto Karinen Ph.D.
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  2. David H. Guston
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Correspondence to David H. Guston .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Programm für Wissenschaftsforschung, Universität Basel, Missionsstr. 21, Basel, 4003, Switzerland

    Mario Kaiser

  2. Programm für Wissenschaftsforschung, Universität Basel, Missionsstr. 21, Basel, 4003, Switzerland

    Monika Kurath

  3. Programm für Wissenschaftsforschung, Universität Basel, Missionsstr. 21, Basel, 4003, Switzerland

    Sabine Maasen

  4. Inst. Medizin- und, Universität Lübeck, Königstr. 42, Lübeck, 23552, Germany

    Christoph Rehmann-Sutter

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Karinen, R., Guston, D.H. (2009). Toward Anticipatory Governance: The Experience with Nanotechnology. In: Kaiser, M., Kurath, M., Maasen, S., Rehmann-Sutter, C. (eds) Governing Future Technologies. Sociology of the Sciences Yearbook, vol 27. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-90-481-2834-1_12

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