Domination in a Scientific Field
Capital Struggle in a Chinese Isotope Lab
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 11924974 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Wei Hong (0000-0001-5779-8912, Tsinghua University, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2008 |
| Volume | 38 |
| Issue | 4 |
| Pages | 543-570 |
| Publication date | 2008-08-01 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Social Studies of Science (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0306-3127 • E-ISSN: 1460-3659 |
| Publisher | SAGE Publishing (PUBLISHER • US) |
| DOI | 10.1177/0306312706092456 |
| OpenAlex | W2106532802 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 15 |
| References cited | 34 |
This paper applies Bourdieu's theory of the scientific field to examine the sources of authority, reasons for conflict, and group dynamics in an isotope lab at a Chinese university. After 7 months of participant observation and non-structured interviews, I found that theoretical capital and technological capital are both used in the isotope lab. While both are associated with scientific authority, it was theoretical capital that determined lab members' social authority. Dominant and subordinate members of the lab applied different strategies to advance their interests. Conflicts of interest induced competition between the holders of theoretical and technological capital, which in turn caused interpersonal conflict. The specificity of the field of geoscience determines the relative power of technological and theoretical capital, and the low autonomy of the scientific field in China strengthens that hierarchy. I find that this hierarchy of scientific capital in the broader field can have a considerable impact on the social construction of experimental results in the local settings
Autonomy · Capital (architecture · Economics · Epistemology · Field (mathematics · Geography · Hierarchy · Interpersonal communication · Political science · Positive economics · Power (physics · Social capital · Social science · Sociology · Symbolic capital · Law · Management and Organizational Studies · scientometrics and bibliometrics research · Social and Cultural Dynamics
Interdisciplinary knowledge integration as a unique knowledge source for technology development and the role of funding allocation
Science, Technology and Society Studies in China
Extending the rails
Climate state
Boundary repair
Bringing Pierre Bourdieu to Science and Technology Studies
The Significance of Scientific Capital in UK Medical Education
Requisitos de entrada al campo científico mexicano
Institutional hierarchies and research impact
Exploring tensions in knowledge networks
Rethinking Science as a Vocation
Authorship Norms and Project Structures in Science
The Virtues of Scientific Practice
Data struggles
Bourdieu's Rationalist Science of Science
Communist Neo-Traditionalism
The sociology of science
Changing order
Personal Knowledge
Technical Dissonance
Outline of a Theory of Practice
The Forms of Capital
The Logic of Practice
The peculiar history of scientific reason
Tacit Knowledge, Trust and the Q of Sapphire
Pierre Bourdieu (1 August 1930 - 23 January 2002)
Doctoring Uncertainty
Lab Hands’ and the ‘Scarlet O’
Technicians and scholars in pursuit of the PhD
An invitation to reflexive sociology
A Framework for the Comparative Analysis of Organizations
Politics and Life Chances in a State Socialist Regime
Managing Laboratory Work through Skepticism
The specificity of the scientific field and the social conditions of the progress of reason
Leviathan and the Air-Pump
In the Backrooms of Science
| Citations per year | 1 |
|---|---|
| Citation span | 2011 - 2026 (16) |
| Highly cited | No |