Democratising Expertise and Socially Robust Knowledge

Research Collection Journal Article Democratising expertise and socially robust knowledge Author(s): Nowotny, Helga Publication Date: 2003 Permanent Link: https://doi.org/10.3929/ethz-b-000423040 Originally published in: Science and Public Policy 30(3), http://doi.org/10.3152/147154303781780461 Rights / License: In Copyright - Non-Commercial Use Permitted This page was generated automatically upon download from the ETH Zurich Research Collection. For more information please consult the Terms of use. ETH Library Science and Public Policy, volume 30, number 3, June 2003, pages 151–156, Beech Tree Publishing, 10 Watford Close, Guildford, Surrey GU1 2EP, England Dilemma of expertise Democratising expertise and socially robust knowledge Helga Nowotny This paper presents arguments for the inherent HE DILEMMA OF EXPERTISE has been ‘transgressiveness’ of expertise. First, it must with us for some time. Plato lets Socrates take address issues that can never be reduced to the Tan outrageously (in modern terms) élitist posi- purely scientific and purely technical, and hence tion. He argues in favour of the aristocratic faction must link up with diverse practices, institutions in the Greek polis, for those who understand and and actors. Second, it addresses audiences that possess knowledge about the “immutable laws of geometry”. He lashes out against the distortions and are never solely composed of fellow-experts, the irrationality that characterise the formation of whose expectations and modes of understanding public opinion and the articulation of political will reflect the heterogeneous experience of mixed among the ‘mob’. To overcome the corruption and audiences. Recent demands for greater account- disorder that appear to threaten his native Athens, ability have created a vast site for social experi- Plato’s solution was to find an immutable anchoring mentation, especially on the supra-national level, point outside the cacophony of political, social and which are briefly reviewed. However, the democ- economic interests of his time. ratisation of expertise also creates tensions, es- The lure of such an ‘external’ certainty, whether pecially on the institutional level. Moving from enshrined in the laws of the gods, of geometry or of reliable knowledge towards socially robust Nature, has been with us ever since. The modern knowledge may be one step forward in negotiat- ‘agora’ (meeting place) can hardly be said to be ing and bringing about a regime of pluralistic populated by the ‘mob’. It is inhabited by a highly articulate, and never before so well-educated popula- expertise. tion. Experience of participating, at least in liberal western democracies, should also have taught citi- zens how to express their views and articulate their demands. Today, there is a widespread expectation that science not only ought to listen to these demands, but also can satisfy them. The incorporation of science into the modern agora, therefore, is an expression of confidence in its potentiality, not a loss of trust. Nevertheless, recognising the need for expert Professor Dr Helga Nowotny is at Society in Science: The knowledge and to understand the role it plays in Branco Weiss Fellowship, ETH-Zentrum, HAA, CH - 8092 Zurich, Switzerland; Tel: +41 1 632 25 30; Fax: +0041 1 632 10 leading to the right decisions, has not resulted in 11; E-mail: [email protected]; Web page: solving the dilemma of expertise. Expertise has http://www.society-in-science.ethz.ch/index.html. never before been so indispensable, while being Science and Public Policy June 2003 0302-3427/03/030151-6 US$08.00 Beech Tree Publishing 2003 151 Democratising expertise and socially robust knowledge “we do not know” has been won only recently, as the Helga Nowotny has been Professor of Social Studies of Science at ETH Zurich and was Director of Collegium consequence of public scandals that have led to a Helveticum until 2002. She is Chair of the European break with ignoble silence or overt lying. Research Advisory Board of the European Commission and Expertise is transgressive in two senses. First, it Director of the post-doctorate Fellowship programme ‘Society in Science. The Branco Weiss Fellowship’. She has must address issues that can never be reduced to the a doctorate in law (University of Vienna) and a PhD in purely scientific and purely technical. The issues sociology (Columbia University, New York). She has held expertise confronts, the practices that are to be ana- teaching and research positions in Vienna, Cambridge, Bielefeld, Berlin and Paris and has been a Fellow at the lysed and assessed as to their consequences, are Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin. She is a member of the characterised by overlaps and interlinkages that bind Scientific or Advisory Board of many scientific and policy- the specialised scientific knowledge to its local and oriented institutions in Europe and Member of the Academia Europaea. She is prizewinner of the “Arthur Burkhardt Preis societal context. To have any predictive value at all, für Wissenschaftsförderung 2002”. She has authored, co- expertise must be able to understand the interlink- authored or edited more than 20 books and published ages that bind diverse practices, institutions and widely on societal development, social studies of science and technology and the relationship between science and networks of diverse actors together. society. The second sense in which expertise is transgressive is that it addresses audiences that are never solely composed of fellow-experts. The narratives of simultaneously so hotly contested. The question of expertise have to be sensitive to a wide range of de- whose knowledge is to be recognised, translated and mands and expectations and relate to the heteroge- incorporated into action has been exacerbated under neous experience of mixed audiences. Speaking only the pressure for democratisation. It has received ad- to decision-makers, like ‘speaking truth to power’, ditional exposure under the constant scrutiny of the has become a risky strategy in itself in an age in mass media. It is highlighted and challenged by hav- which transparency, public access to deliberations ing to manage uncertainty about such diverse issues and assessment procedures, are the order of the day. and public concerns as climate change, BSE (bovine The inherent transgressiveness of expertise in- spongiform encephalopathy or ‘mad cow disease’), creases its vulnerability to contestation. By defini- GMOs (genetically modified organisms) or stem cell tion, experts speak about matters that transcend their research. competence as defined in purely scientific–technical Yet the dilemma of expertise and its vulnerability terms. Even the protection provided by speaking in a is not the result of any risk society. Rather, in the collective voice, to give advice as a committee and provocative verdict of Niklas Luhmann (1996), “so- to generate authority in a self-authorising way, does ciety is shocked by its risks because there is no solu- not confer immunity against contestation. Nor are tion to this problem”. This is not a denial of the need recurrent, but futile attempts helpful, that seek to to assess, manage and contain risks, but the assertion tighten the boundaries of scientific–technical exper- that in modern societies there can be no safe way of tise to prevent them trespassing. The complexities of making decisions. Decisions are events to distin- the social and political world demand the contrary: a guish between our observations of the past and an- widening of scientific–technical expertise, exercises ticipations of the future. To the extent that the future in comparative judgement and the ability to move depends on the decisions taken by others, it becomes back and forth, that is, to transgress the boundaries even more uncertain. Systems and individuals attrib- between specialised knowledge and its multiple, ute risks, turning risk therefore into a problem of many-layered (and often unforeseeable) context of attribution which remains inherent to modern society implication. (Luhmann, 1996). Expertise has always been pragmatic as well as transgressive. Its pragmatism results from being de- Accountability and international regulations fined in particular contexts. When acting as experts, scientists do not respond to questions that they have Undoubtedly, the recent demands for greater ac- chosen — in contrast to their research. Conse- countability have created in many European coun- quently, they are forced to transgress the limits of tries a vast new site for experimentation, seeking to their competence. There are situations in which they extend the notion of expertise beyond the traditional are under instant and intense pressure to respond to a definition of knowledge coming from certified sci- crisis in decision-making, when neither all necessary entific and technical experts (de Jong and Mentzel, knowledge nor sufficient information is available, 2001). In a recent EU (European Union) working uncertainties abound and yet action must be taken. document, experts are declared to have become “key Experts have to synthesise all available knowledge actors of governance: either as proactive agenda- and of necessity transgress the boundaries of their setters in their own right or, more often, as resources discipline as well as the constraints of their own limits for actors in government, business and civil soci- of knowledge. Frequently, they feel under pressure of ety”(EC, 2001). having to act as if they knew the answers

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