Public Participation, Science and Society

Abstract

The field of public participation is developing fast, with phenomena such as citizen science and crowdsourcing extending the resource base of research, stimulating innovation and making science more accessible to the general population.Promoting public participation means giving more weight to citizens and civil society actors in the definition of research needs and in the implementation of research and innovation. As yet, there is limited understanding of the implications of widespread use of public participation and as a result, there is a risk that it will become a burden for research and an obstacle to bridging the gap between research and society. This volume presents the findings of a three-year international study on innovative public participation. The resulting work studies the characteristics and trends of innovative public participation through a global sample of 38 case studies. It provides theoretical generalisations on the dynamics of public participation, suggestions for an evaluation framework and clear empirical examples of how public participation works in practice. Illustrated by best practice cases, the authors identify characteristics which contribute to successful public participation.The book is aimed primarily at scholars and practitioners of public participation, as well as research managers, policy makers and business actors interested in related issues. There is also a secondary market for students and scholars of European governance studies, sociology and political sciences.

Public engagement and argumentation in science

“…Moreover, while some practices involve one-way communication, in which information flows from one group to another, others involve two-way communication, in which dialogue is encouraged and information flows in both directions. The Public Engagement 2020 project (PE2020) provides an analysis of various PE activities that have been implemented between 1992 and 2018 and, based on the direction of the information flow and purpose of the activities, suggests classifying them into 5 main categories (Rask et al, 2018 , 20–21):…”

“…It aims at informing and educating citizens, and typically does not include mechanisms to handle and integrate feedback from the public. An example is the Nanodialogue Project (Rask et al, 2018 , 42): one of its main goals was to develop channels to communicate research developments in nanotechnologies and nanosciences to the general public.…”

“…Public consultations are initiated by sponsors that seek to gauge the public’s opinions on a certain topic so as to inform decision-makers, but no two-way dialogue is involved. For instance, the VOICES Project was a year-long (2013–2014) public consultation initiative which collected European citizens’ preferences and expectations regarding European research priorities (Rask et al, 2018 , 42).…”

“…It involves dialogues between the sponsors, scientists, and the public in which information is exchanged, primarily in the form of arguments. The World Wide Views on Global Warming is an example of global citizen deliberation, which focused on producing policy recommendations regarding climate change (Rask et al, 2018 , 100).…”

“…It involves dialogues between the sponsors and the public in which information is exchanged. An example of public participation is the We the Citizens project, a PE initiative that enabled citizens to contribute to the design of the Irish Constitutional Convention (Rask et al, 2018 , 71–72).…”