How Politics Deals with Expert Dissent
The Case of Ethics Councils
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 5337986 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Alexander Bogner (0000-0002-4211-2858, Institute of Technology Assessment of the Austrian Academy of Sciences, Vienna, Austria), Wolfgang Menz (0000-0002-5554-3534, Institut für Sozialwissenschaftliche Forschung e.V., ISF München, Munich, Germany, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2010 |
| Volume | 35 |
| Issue | 6 |
| Pages | 888-914 |
| Publication date | 2010-11-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Science Technology & Human Values (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0162-2439 • E-ISSN: 1552-8251 |
| Publisher | SAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.1177/0162243909357913 |
| OpenAlex | W2060766216 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 15 |
| References cited | 26 |
Over recent years, science and technology have been reassessed increasingly in ethical terms. Particularly for life science governance, ethics has become the dominant discourse. In the course of this ''ethical turn'' national ethics councils were set up throughout Europe and in the United States to advice politics in ethically controversial issues such as stem cell research and genetic testing. Ethics experts have become subject to traditional warnings against expertocracy: they are suspected to unduly influence political decision-making. However, any reliable ethics expertise has to reflect societal disagreements in moral issues. Therefore, expert dissent is a normal feature of legitimate ethics expertise. Based on theoretical considerations we argue that in principle, expert dissent does not cause problems for political legitimacy; rather, it enhances the salience of politics: obviously decisions on ethical issues cannot be taken on the basis of expert knowledge alone. We therefore conclude that expert dissent, not consent, supports politics. Focussing on Germany and Austria, we show how politics deal with expert dissent in practice. While in Germany politics acknowledge dissent and use it to foster a fundamental political debate, Austrian politics attribute authoritative power to ethics expertise and try to construct an overall consensus. This illustrates how the drawing of boundaries between politic and expertise differs
Dissent · Engineering ethics · Environmental ethics · Legitimacy · Political dissent · Political science · Politics · Sociology · Biomedical Ethics and Regulation · Ethics in Clinical Research · Ethics in medical practice · Law · Psychology
Seed Schools in Colombia and the Generative Character of Sociotechnical Dissent
Stories of creation
Integrating Immigrants in Europe
What constitutes expertise in research ethics and integrity
Conforming to global policy trends
Ethics expertise in political regulation of biomedicine
Strong Will in a Messy World. Ethics and the Government of Technoscience
Worries About Philosopher Experts
You’re Dead!’
Politicizing science
Different ways of problematising biotechnology – and what it means for technology governance
Socially enacted ethics
The construction and spread of global models
Advisory bodies and morality policies
Ethics Expertise and Public Credibility
Risk Society
Die Sprache der Ethik und die Politik des richtigen Sprechens. Ethikregime in Deutschland, Frankreich und Großbritannien
Governing Molecules
Designs on Nature
Rethinking Expertise
Frame analysis
The new genetics and health
Boundaries of Science
The Honest Broker
Debating the risks and ethics of emerging technosciences
The Third Wave of Science Studies
The German Politics Lecture 2008
Risk society
Biotechnology in Switzerland
Framing
| Unique citing works | 15 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 1,07 |
| Citation span | 2012 - 2025 (14) |
| Citation velocity | recent |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 13 |