Abstract
In recent years, in the UK and elsewhere, scientists and science policymakers have grappled with the question of how to reap the benefits of nanotechnologies while minimising the risks. Having recognised the importance of public support for future innovations, they have placed increasing emphasis on ‘engaging’ ‘the public’ during the early phase of technology development. Meaningful engagement suggests some common ground between experts and lay publics in relation to the definition of nanotechnologies and of their benefits and risks. However, views on nanotechnologies are likely to vary according to where actors stand in the technology production/consumption/assessment cycle. Drawing on data from a recent UK-based study, this article examines how scientists (‘upstream’ and ‘downstream’) and policymakers portray the benefits and risks of nanotechnologies, particularly as they relate to two major areas of predicted application, namely medicine/public health and environmental sustainability. The findings reveal that, in the main, scientists and science policymakers held a positive conception of nanotechnologies and see imminent applications, although they acknowledged particular risks, including adverse public reaction. While definitions of ‘benefit’ and ‘risk’ varied, most saw the benefits as outweighing the risks and believed that the risks could be adequately regulated once they were assessed. The difficulties of assessing risk, however, were acknowledged. The study raises a number of questions that will need to be addressed if regulations are to be developed that not only protect people’s heath and wellbeing and the environment but also engender public trust in nanotechnologies.
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Notes
In the domain of science and technology, ‘policymaker’ may be conceived broadly to refer to formal political actors (politicians) who make decisions that shape policies affecting the overall direction and practices of science and technology at the international, national, regional and local levels, as well as local decision-makers who play a formal or informal role in the multitude of day-to-day decisions about the funding, conduct and assessment of research and development; e.g. research council programme officers, research centre managers, members of research ethics committees, science policy advisors, technology transfer specialists. Scientists often draw a distinction between science/scientific research, on the one hand, and society/policymaking, on the other, which is far from clear in practice. The drawing of such a distinction may serve in ‘boundary work’ or the rhetorical purpose of buttressing the authority of science and its claim to be untainted by social influence or interests and thus objective or value-free (see, e.g. [5]).
This conference was held in London, 18th–19th September 2006 and it was hosted by the UK Branch of the Society of Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry (SETAC_UK) and the Society for Experimental Biology (SEB). However, one of the conference organisers, Dr Richard Handy (SETAC_UK Branch President 2006) described the conference as ‘ultimately a joint venture between STEAC_UK...the Society for Experimental Biology... the Environment Agency, UK, the Society of Chemical Industry (SCI)...and in collaboration with the Natural Environment Research Council and DEFRA’ (conference programme, p.2). Our study was funded by the British Academy, and we were assisted in our data collection by Dr Rachel Torr, to whom we are grateful.
As Powell explains, ‘“Upstream’ scientists design and develop new (and usually synthetic) materials’, and include engineers, chemists, physicists, materials scientists and, increasingly, biologists [12]. In her view, they are concerned with the properties and characteristics that make materials work. ‘Downstream’ scientists, on the other hand, comprise ‘toxicologists, epidemiologists, and other public health scientists who study and monitor the environmental materials that are created by the ‘upstream’ scientists [12].
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Petersen, A., Anderson, A. A Question of Balance or Blind Faith?: Scientists’ and Science Policymakers’ Representations of the Benefits and Risks of Nanotechnologies. Nanoethics 1, 243–256 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11569-007-0021-8
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11569-007-0021-8