8 - What Can Science and Technological Studies Say about Science and Democracy?

Summary

Introduction

Throughout this book, we have discussed a range of challenges and possibilities that arise in relation to science and expertise. These include the boundaries between science and democracy, or more generally between science and politics, and how concerned groups or the general public can be involved in technoscientific issues. It is almost impossible to find areas in life that has not been influenced by technoscientific developments. When the results of science inflict on people's lives and when political decisions and public discussions are framed by scientific expertise, fundamental and classical issues concerning democracy emerge: Who is concerned? Who governs? Who benefits? What negative impacts and uncertainties are to be found? Our focus on scientific knowledge and expertise could be assessed as a limitation in our approach to democracy, however we argue that science and technology developments inevitably shape social order and therefore also impinge on how we can imagine and practice democracy. In this final chapter, we present our view on how STS can contribute to an improved understanding of the interplay between science and democracy.

In the introduction to this book, we referred to the shadow theory of democracy, which points to the hidden assumptions and unexplored premises of democratic theory. These hidden premises can also be thought of as vulnerabilities of todays’ liberal democracies concerning questions such as: Who is the public? Who governs? How can we guarantee that democracy leads to equal outcomes? (Gustavsson 2018). These are termed ‘vulnerabilities’ because they are often assumed to be connected to clear answers. But they seldom are, and they can, therefore, lead to mistrust in the democratic system altogether. They can also pave the way for charismatic leaders that give clear answers to these questions, even though these types of answer do not really exist. The public is not easily demarcated, since those who are concerned by decisions cannot always be identified in the population within a nation state. Moreover, those who govern are far from limited to publicly elected politicians, but include a range of individual and organizational decision makers, and they may have to deal with lock-ins that are difficult to change and hence claim control over.