The Issues Deserve More Credit: Pragmatist Contributions to the Study of Public Involvement in Controversy Export

@article{citeulike:4074975, abstract = {This paper explores the `issue-oriented' perspective on public involvement in politics opened up by recent research in Science and Technology Studies (STS). This research proposes that public controversy around techno-scientific issues is dedicated to the articulation of these issues and their eventual accommodation in society. It does not, however, fully answer the question of why issue formation should be appreciated as a crucial dimension of democratic politics. To address this question, I turn to the work of two early 20th-century American pragmatists: John Dewey and Walter Lippmann. In their work on democracy in industrial society, they conceived of public involvement in politics as being occasioned by, and providing a way to settle, controversies that existing institutions were unable to resolve. Moreover, Dewey developed a `socio-ontological' understanding of issues, which suggests that people's involvement in politics is mediated by problems that affect them. Dewey and Lippmann thus provide important argumentative resources for further elaborating the approach to public involvement developed in STS. STS research has also developed a `socio-ontological' approach, as it focuses on the `attachments' that people mobilize (and that mobilize people) in the performance of their concern with public affairs. Such an approach provides an alternative to discursivist analysis of the role of `issue framing' in the involvement of publics in politics. 10.1177/0306312706077367}, author = {Marres, Noortje}, citeulike-article-id = {4074975}, citeulike-linkout-0 = {http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0306312706077367}, citeulike-linkout-1 = {http://sss.sagepub.com/content/37/5/759.abstract}, citeulike-linkout-2 = {http://sss.sagepub.com/content/37/5/759.full.pdf}, citeulike-linkout-3 = {http://sss.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/37/5/759}, day = {1}, doi = {10.1177/0306312706077367}, journal = {Social Studies of Science}, keywords = {controversy, involvement, politics, public}, month = {October}, number = {5}, pages = {759--780}, posted-at = {2009-11-01 23:09:59}, priority = {2}, title = {The Issues Deserve More Credit: Pragmatist Contributions to the Study of Public Involvement in Controversy}, url = {http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0306312706077367}, volume = {37}, year = {2007} }

TY - JOUR ID - citeulike:4074975 L3 - citeulike-article-id:4074975 N2 - This paper explores the `issue-oriented' perspective on public involvement in politics opened up by recent research in Science and Technology Studies (STS). This research proposes that public controversy around techno-scientific issues is dedicated to the articulation of these issues and their eventual accommodation in society. It does not, however, fully answer the question of why issue formation should be appreciated as a crucial dimension of democratic politics. To address this question, I turn to the work of two early 20th-century American pragmatists: John Dewey and Walter Lippmann. In their work on democracy in industrial society, they conceived of public involvement in politics as being occasioned by, and providing a way to settle, controversies that existing institutions were unable to resolve. Moreover, Dewey developed a `socio-ontological' understanding of issues, which suggests that people's involvement in politics is mediated by problems that affect them. Dewey and Lippmann thus provide important argumentative resources for further elaborating the approach to public involvement developed in STS. STS research has also developed a `socio-ontological' approach, as it focuses on the `attachments' that people mobilize (and that mobilize people) in the performance of their concern with public affairs. Such an approach provides an alternative to discursivist analysis of the role of `issue framing' in the involvement of publics in politics. 10.1177/0306312706077367 IS - 5 JF - Social Studies of Science EP - 780 TI - The Issues Deserve More Credit: Pragmatist Contributions to the Study of Public Involvement in Controversy VL - 37 SP - 759 KW - controversy KW - involvement KW - politics KW - public AU - Marres, Noortje PY - 2007/10/01/ UR - http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0306312706077367 ER -