Science Shops in Europe: the Public As Stakeholder
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Science and Pubtic Poticy, volume 31, number 3. June 2004, pages 199-211, Beech Tree Publishing. 10 Watford Close, Guildford, Surrey GUI 2EP, England Science shops Science shops in Europe: the public as stakeholder Corinna Fischer, Loet Leydesdorff and Malte Schophaus After two decades of relative silence, science shops HE SCIENCE SHOP MODEL seems to be seem to be back on the agenda of science pol- back on the agenda of science policy-making icy-making. In this article, country-specific and Tin Europe (Hellemans, 2001; Farkas, 2002). country-independent factors for their success and New science shops are being founded, like the failure and their co-operation with civil society are Brunei University Science Shop (BUSS) in London discussed in terms of different traditions in politi- (August 2002), which is funded by the Higher Edu- cation Active Community Fund, and two new ones cal culture. Science shops seem to be at a cross- in Belgium (at the University of Antwerp and the roads, where their work focus and their coalitions University of Brussels, 2003).' may have to change. On the one hand, they are The European Commission in its Science and So- still connected to their roots, the social move- ciety Action Plan of 4 December 2001, stated that ments. On the other hand, a general trend towards more than 60 science shops exist in Europe, mainly business co-operation in science policy can be ob- in the Netherlands, Germany, Austria, the United served. The increasing debate about science and Kingdom, and France. The Commission proposed an society interfaces lends importance to the science action plan to enhance the networking of science shop concept, as is especially visible in the recent shops and the creation of a structure for the inven- support given them by the European Commission. tory and dissemination of "work carried out on be- half of citizens and associations" (European Commission, 2002, page 15).^ The idea of science shops can be considered as an Corinna Fischer is at the Environmental Policy Research Centre, offspring of the political movements from the 1960s Freie Universitat Berlin, Ihnestr 22, D-14195 Berlin, Germany; Tel,: +49 30 83 85 44 94; Fax : +49 30 83 85 66 85; E-mail: onwards. Science shops were conceptualised for the cofiffu@zedat,fu-berlin,de, Loet Leydesdorff is at the Amsterdam purpose of moderating between academic scientists School of Communications Research, Kloveniersburgwal 48, and organisations that cannot afford to fund their 1012 CX Amsterdam, The Netherlands; Tel: +31 20 525 6598; own research. The SCIPAS project, an association of Fax: +31 20 525 3681; E-mail: loet@leydesdorff,net, Malte 13 partners from nine countries, described them as Schophaus is at the Institute for Science and Technology Studies (IWT), University of Bielefeld, PO Box 10 01 31, D-33501 providing "independent, participatory research sup- Bielefeld, Germany; Tel: +49 521 106 4676; Fax: +49 521 106 port in response to concerns experienced by civil 6418; E-mail: malte,schophaus@iwt,uni-bielefeld,de. society" (Gnaiger and Martin, 2001). This article is based on results of EU-funded project 'Improving They offer citizens, non-governmental organisa- Interaction among NGOs, Universities and Science Shops: exper- tions (NGOs), municipalities, and sometimes small iences and expectations' (INTERACT) (http://members,chello,at/ and medium enterprises free or very low-cost access wilawien/interacts/main,html). The authors acknowledge the to scientific and technological knowledge and re- discussion with their partners in this project and the preceding SCIPAS project. They especially thank Annette Wallentin for her search in a wide range of disciplines. The term 'sci- major contributions, Mark Brown, Arlena Jung, Henk Mulder, ence' is used in its broadest sense, incorporating Wolfgang Endler and anonymous referees for helpful comments. social sciences and the humanities as well as natural Science and Public Policy June 2004 0302-3427/04/030199-13 US$08,00 © Beech Tree Publishing 2004 199 Science shops in Europe; the public as stakeholder final sections, we draw conclusions and specify pol- Malte Schophaus, bom in 1972, studied psychology and icy implications. sociology at the Freie Universitat Berlin and the University of Caiifornia, Irvine, USA. Currently he is a doctoral research fellow at the Institute for Science and Technology Studies (IWT) within the graduate programme 'Entering the Knowl- History and current status edge Society' at the University of Bielefeld. His main re- search interest focuses on science advice, interdisciplinary co-operation, citizen participation and environmental In the establishment process of science shops in psychology. In his dissertation he investigates the role of Europe, four 'waves' can be distinguished. scientific knowledge In the social-justice movement. Corinna Fischer, born in 1971, studied political science and First wave psychology, graduated in political science and holds a PhD in sociology. Her main areas of interest are environmental con- The oldest shops were set up in the Netherlands in the sciousness and behaviour, sustainable consumption, political activism and political socialisation. Besides her research in 1970s, following the students' movement (Leydes- these areas, she also works as a policy consultant, counsellor dorff and van den Besselaar, 1987a; Farkas, 1999; and facilitator for NGOs, as well as in political education. At 2002). The institutionalisation of the Dutch science the moment, she works at the Environmental Research Cen- shops can be considered a result of the political pro- tre, Free University of Berlin, in an interdisciplinary junior research group "Transformation and Innovation in Power gramme of a left-wing coalition that had won the elec- Systems (TIPS)". Her topic is the consumers'role in achiev- tions of 1973 under the motto of "equal distribution of ing a more sustainable electricity system. income, wealth, and knowledge". The Minister for Loet Leydesdorff reads science, technology, and innovation Science Policy at that time, Fokele Trip, actively studies at the Amsterdam School of Communications Re- stimulated what became known as 'the democratisa- search (ASCoR) of the University of Amsterdam. He has tion of science' both internally and externally. He published extensively in scientometrics, the sociology of innovation, and about university-industry-government rela- welcomed proposals such as the science shops. tions (the Triple Helix). His main research interest focuses The first science shop was established in 1973 at on measuring and simulating the knowledge base of an the chemistry faculty in Utrecht. In 1978, the Uni- economy using models of complex systems theory like autopoiesis. A recent monograph entitled "A Sociological versity of Amsterdam decided to organise a science Theory of Communication: The Self-Organization of the shop at university level both as a service to the lar- Knowledge-Based Society" can be retrieved from his home ger community and as an instrument for further page at http://www.leydesdorff.net. developing its science policy in discussion with relevant NGOs (Zaal and Leydesdorff, 1987). The Dutch Federation of Trade Unions supported this development to the degree that a representative par- sciences (Gnaiger and Martin, 2001). In practice, ticipated in the meetings of the daily board of this science shops deal mainly with questions related to science shop (Leydesdorff ef a/, 1984). environmental issues, health, education, labour, law, Other universities followed to a variable extent housing, and developmental issues. with differences in relative emphasis on a service Since the founding of the first science shops in the component, an activist component, and the use of Netherlands in the 1970s, the concept spread the shop as an instrument of research policy. The throughout Western Europe and to Israel, Romania, science shops of this first period can be considered South Africa, the USA and Canada during the 1980s in relation to similar attempts in other countries to and 1990s. Science shops are, or were, active in at democratise science and technology policies, for least nine European countries: Austria, Belgium, example, industrial workers' plans in the UK (Coo- Denmark, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Spain, ley, 1980), the research programme for the 'humani- Romania, and the United Kingdom. Mulder et al sation of labour' in the Federal Republic of (2001) also mentioned that initiatives have been re- Germany, and alternative product designs in Scandi- ported in Finland, Sweden, Italy, Switzerland, and navia (LO, 1982; Leydesdorff and van den Besse- Norway. The concept of science shops has been laar, 1987b). picked up in other countries such as the 'new' South Africa and South Korea. Second wave In this paper, we assess the future of the model in the light of its historical development and the current In the 1980s, science shops of a second wave state of affairs in Europe. We compare the develop- evolved in Germany, France and Denmark, as well ment of science shops in several European countries as two shops in Belgium. These shops can be con- and try to link the variety of patterns of science shop sidered as by-products of alternative movements activities to differences in the social and political such as Burgerinitiativen (citizens' initiatives) in environment. First, we discuss the history and cur- Germany. The environmental movement of that time rent situation of science shops in Europe. Then we had a strong impact on these developments, which compare the developments in six European countries were mainly based on collaborations with emerging (Austria, Denmark, Germany, Romania, Spain, and university departments in environmental sciences. the United Kingdom) in more detail based on a re- Some of these science shops still focus exclusively cent survey (Fischer and Wallentin, 2002). In the on environmental issues. 200 Science and Public Policy June 2004 Science shops in Europe: the public as stakeholder Third wave During the 1990s, a 'revival' of the science shop In a fourth wave, science shops were idea can be diagnosed and traced back to a change in started in the Central and East the discourse about science and society.