Normative Reflexions on Constructivist Approaches to Science and Technology

Social Studies of Science

Volumn 22, Issue 1, 1992, Pages 141-173

  Radder, Hans ^a  

^a VU UNIVERSITY AMSTERDAM   (Netherlands)

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EID: 84972596128     PISSN: 03063127     EISSN: 14603659     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1177/0306312792022001009     Document Type: Article

References (103)

1. The point has also been made by other authors: see, for example, D.E. Chubin and S. Restivo, ‘The “Mooting” of Science Studies: Research Programmes and Science Policy’, in K.D. Knorr-Cetina and M. Mulkay (eds), Science Observed (London: Sage, 1983), 53-83
2. S. Russell, The Social Construction of Artefacts: A Response to Pinch and Bijker’, Social Studies of Science, Vol. 16 (1986), 331-46
3. K. Horstman, ‘Dilemma's van professionele geschiedsschrijving’, Kennis en Methode, Vol. 12 (1988), 73-85
4. S. Fuller, Social Epistemology (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1988), 266-68
5. D. Pels, ‘De “natuurlijke saamhorigheid” van feiten en waarden’, Kennis en Methode, Vol. 14 (1990), 14-43 (esp. 19-20)
6. W.T. Lynch and E.R. Fuhrman, ‘Recovering and Expanding the Normative: Marx and the New Sociology of Scientific Knowledge’, Science, Technology, and Human Values, Vol. 16 (1991), 233-48.
7. The Strong Programme will be largely left aside. For a critique of its neglect of normative questions, see Lynch & Fuhrman, note 1.
8. H.M. Collins, ‘The Seven Sexes: A Study in the Sociology of a Phenomenon, or the Replication of Experiments in Physics’, Sociology, Vol. 9 (1975), 205-24, at 224.
9. B. Barnes and D. Bloor, ‘Relativism, Rationalism and the Sociology of Knowledge’, in M. Hollis and S. Lukes (eds), Rationality and Relativism (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1982), 21-47, at 47.
10. B. Latour, ‘Hoe “De Heerser” te schrijven voor zowel machines als machinaties?’, Krisis, Vol. 7, No. 1 (1987), 42-66, at 30-31. English version: ‘The Prince for Machines as Well as for Machinations’, in B. Elliott (ed.), Technology and Social Process (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1988).
11. For example, R. Schwartz Cowan, ‘The Industrial Revolution in the Home’, in D. MacKenzie and J. Wajcman (eds), The Social Shaping of Technology (Milton Keynes, Bucks: Open University Press, 1985), 181-201.
12. D. MacKenzie, ‘Missile Accuracy: A Case Study in the Social Processes of Technological Change’, in W.E. Bijker, T.P. Hughes and T.J. Pinch (eds), The Social Construction of Technological Systems (Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 1987), 195- 222, at 218.
13. See D. MacKenzie, ‘Science and Technology Studies and the Question of the Military’, Social Studies of Science, Vol. 16 (1986), 361-71.
14. See E.F. Keller, ‘Feminist Perspectives on Science Studies’, Science, Technology, and Human Values, Vol. 13 (1988), 235-49.
15. See H.M. Collins, ‘Stages in the Empirical Programme of Relativism’, Social Studies of Science, Vol. 11 (1981), 3-10
16. Collins, ‘An Empirical Relativist Programme in the Sociology of Scientific Knowledge’, in Knorr-Cetina & Mulkay (eds), note 1, 85-113
17. T.J. Pinch and W.E. Bijker, ‘The Social Construction of Facts and Artefacts: Or how the Sociology of Science and the Sociology of Technology Might Benefit each other’, Social Studies of Science, Vol. 14 (1984), 399-441.
18. For some recent examples, see the ‘Abstracts of the 1988 joint 4S/EASST Conference’, Science, Technology, and Human Values, Vol. 13 (1988), 83-206, the papers by Brouwer (101-02), Oudshoorn (163-64), Potter (171) and Van den Wijngaard (202-03). Despite these examples, Keller is right in claiming that, up to the present, sociologists of scientific knowledge have been largely gender-blind: see Keller, note 9.
19. T.J. Pinch and W.E. Bijker, ‘Science, Relativism and the New Sociology of Technology: Reply to Russell’, Social Studies of Science, Vol. 16 (1986), 347-60, esp. 354-57.
20. Cf. for example, D. Noble, ‘Social Choice in Machine Design’, in A. Zimbalist (ed.), Case Studies in the Labor Process (New York: Monthly Review Press, 1979), 18-50.
21. M. Gallon, J. Law and A. Rip, ‘How to Study the Force of Science’, in Gallon, Law and Rip (eds), Mapping the Dynamics of Science and Technology (London: Macmillan, 1986), 3-15, at 15.
22. Gallon, Law & Rip, note 14, 6; see also 15.
23. S. Woolgar, Science: The Very Idea (Chichester, Sussex & London: Ellis Horwood & Tavistock Publications, 1988), 92.
24. S. Woolgar (ed.), Knowledge and Reflexivity (London: Sage, 1988).
25. Woolgar, note 16, 105.
26. See Woolgar, 94 and 34.
27. See Woolgar, 101 and 103-05.
28. And for good reasons, it seems, since, as Barnes once subtly remarked: ‘With cream-cakes there is a chance of satisfying hunger - with accounts of cream-cakes there is not: B. Barnes, ‘On the “Hows” and “Whys” of Cultural Change’, Social Studies of Science, Vol. 11 (1981), 481-98, at 492.
29. S. Woolgar, ‘The Very Idea of Social Epistemology: What Prospects for a Truly Radical “Radically Naturalised Epistemology” forthcoming in Inquiry, Vol. 34 (1991).
30. See S. Woolgar and M. Ashmore, ‘The Next Step: an Introduction to the Reflexive Project’, in Woolgar (ed.), note 17, 1-11, at 10.
31. See R. Rorty, Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1979).
32. Such a ‘Let a hundred flowers bloom strategy’ seems to be advocated in B. Latour, ‘The Politics of Explanation: an Alternative’, in Woolgar (ed.), note 17, 155-76, at 169-75.
33. A. Mol, ‘Wat je zegt, ben je dat zelf?’, Kermis en Methode, Vol. 13 (1989), 257-62, at 259.
34. Woolgar, note 16, 65.
35. L. Wittgenstein, Ueber Gewissheit/On Certainty (Oxford: Blackwell, 1974), 46e and 44e.
36. Even Latour complains: ‘if only God - or Mammon - willing, I could write in my own mother tongue!’: Latour, note 25, 171.
37. Cf. Â. Latour and S. Woolgar, Laboratory Life (London: Sage, 1979)
38. K.D. Knorr-Cetina, ‘The Ethnographic Study of Scientific Work: Towards a Constructivist Interpretation of Science’, in Knorr-Cetina & Mulkay (eds), note 1,115-40
39. M. Lynch, E. Livingston and H. Garfinkel, ‘Temporal Order in Laboratory Work’, in note 205-38
40. Woolgar, note 16.
41. M. Callon and B. Latour, ‘Unscrewing the Big Leviathan: How Actors Macro-Structure Reality and how Sociologists Help them to Do So’, in K. Knorr-Cetina and A.V. Cicourel (eds), Advances in Social Theory and Methodology: Toward an Integration of Micro- and Macro-sociologies (Boston, MA: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1981), 277-303, at 296. See also B. Latour, Science in Action (Milton Keynes, Bucks.: Open University Press, 1987), 229.
42. Some constructivists, however, hold a more balanced view, in which both change and continuity and both actors and structures have a place: see, especially, W. Bijker, ‘Do not Despair: There is Life after Constructivism’, Kennis en Methode, Vol. 14 (1990), 324-45. On the other hand, it seems to me that conceding this much takes you well beyond constructivism. Cf. also R. Hagendijk, ‘Structuration Theory, Constructivism, and Scientific Change’, in S.E. Cozzens and T.F. Gieryn (eds), Theories of Science in Society (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1990), 43-66.
43. Cf. S. Shapin and S. Schaffer, Leviathan and the Air-Pump: Hobbes, Boyle and the Experimental Life (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1985).
44. Cf. Latour, note 31
45. A. Borgmann, Technology and the Character of Contemporary Life (Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press, 1984).
46. Cf. J. Rouse, Knowledge and Power (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1987), 111-19.
47. Cf. T.P. Hughes, The Evolution of Large Technological Systems’, in Bijker, Hughes & Pinch (eds), note 7, 51-82; Latour, note 31.
48. Cf. MacKenzie & Wajcman (eds), note 6, Part 4
49. Latour, note 31, 167-73.
50. Cf. W. Schafer (ed.), Finalization in Science (Dordrecht: Reidel, 1983).
51. See H.M. Collins, Changing Order (London: Sage, 1985), 19.
52. See H. Radder, ‘Experimenting in the Natural Sciences. A Philosophical Approach’, forthcoming in J. Buchwald (ed.), Philosophical and Historiographic Problems about Small-Scale Experiments (Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press).
53. In a similar vein, Nickles argues for the methodological significance of reconstruction in the practice of science. His distinction between ‘single-pass’ and ‘multi-pass’ accounts of science is especially important in this respect: see Th. Nickles, ‘Reconstructing Science: Discovery and Experiment’, in D. Batens and J.P. van Bendegem (eds), Theory and Experiment (Dordrecht: Reidel, 1988), 33-53.
54. Woolgar, note 16, 48.
55. B. Wynne, ‘Unruly Technology: Practical Rules, Impractical Discourses and Public Understanding’, Social Studies of Science, Vol. 18 (1988), 147-67, at 153.
56. E. Richards and J. Schuster, ‘The Feminine Method as Myth and Accounting Resource: A Challenge to Gender Studies and Social Studies of Science’, Social Studies of Science, Vol. 19 (1989), 697-720, at 700.
57. See Radder, note 40, Section 5. Cf. also the discussion on values, norms and practice in D.K. Henderson, ‘On the Sociology of Science and the Continuing Importance of Epistemologically Couched Accounts’, Social Studies of Science, Vol. 20(1990), 113-48, at 128-33.
58. N. Cartwright, How the Laws of Physics Lie (New York: Oxford University Press, 1983).
59. Rouse, note 35, 85.
60. D. MacKenzie and G. Spinardi, ‘The Shaping of Nuclear Weapon System Technology: US Fleet Ballistic Missile Guidance and Navigation: I: From Polaris to Poseidon’, Social Studies of Science, Vol. 18 (1988), 419-63, and É: “Going for Broke” - The Path to Trident ÉÃ, 581-624.
61. For other cases, see P. Galison, How Experiments End (Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press, 1987), esp. 10-13
62. H. Radder, ‘Heuristics and the Generalized Correspondence Principle’, The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science, Vol. 42 (1991), 195-226
63. G.L. Downey, ‘Reproducing Cultural Identity in Negotiating Nuclear Power: The Union of Concerned Scientists and Emergency Core Cooling’, Social Studies of Science, Vol. 18 (1988), 231-64
64. S.L. Star and J.R. Griesemer, ‘Institutional Ecology, “Translations” and Boundary Objects: Amateurs and Professionals in Berkeley's Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, 1907-39’, Vol. 19 (1989), 387-420.
65. Also, Wynne acknowledges the existence of more general patterns: ‘The technology should embody some general principles (it should not work only by chance) because otherwise there is no reproducibility, or transportability to other contexts’ (Wynne, note 43,152)
66. 'Thus although rationalization of social worlds takes place to meet the “imperatives” of a (universal) technology, at the same time differentiation of the technology takes place in order to correspond with the variety of social and physical worlds in which it is enacted’ (154). Unfortunately, perhaps as a consequence of his view that ‘rules follow practices’, we read in Wynne's paper far less about the role played by these ‘general principles’ and ‘rationalization processes’ than about the ‘unruly’, local practices.
67. For this notion, see A. Fine, The Shaky Game (Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press, 1986), Chapters 7 and 8. Cf. also Rouse, note 35, Chapter 5.
68. Woolgar, note 16, 73. See also p. 54, where he writes: ‘a major thrust of post-modern critiques of science is to suggest the essential equivalence of ontology and epistemology: how we know is what exists'.
69. Bijker, Hughes & Pinch (eds), note 7, 109.
70. Collins, note 39, 16 (my emphasis). Also Knorr-Cetina and Mulkay point to the general significance of this type of relativism to social studies of science
71. K.D. Knorr-Cetina and M. Mulkay, ‘Introduction: Emerging Principles in Social Studies of Science’, in Knorr-Cetina & Mulkay (eds), note 1, 1-17, at 5-6.
72. Collins, note 10, 99.
73. See H. Radder, The Material Realization of Science (Assen: Van Gorcum, 1988), esp. Chapter 4. So, I agree with Woolgar that the conceptual representations of science should not be interpreted in a realist manner. But in contrast to Woolgar I do not think that, therefore, the whole practice of representation should be revolutionized. As I argued in the preceding section, in specific contexts specific representations may very well be plausible, reliable, useful and desirable. It will also be clear that my referential realism is more modest than the transcendental realism advocated by Bhaskar. In particular, I do not claim that scientific realism is required for human emancipation: see R. Bhaskar, Scientific Realism and Human Emancipation (London: Verso, 1986).
74. The arguments in this section aim at a reductio ad absurdum of ontological and epistemological relativism. Note that the argument does not work for all forms of antirealism. It does not, for instance, apply to van Fraassen's constructive empiricism: see B. Van Fraassen, The Scientific Image (Oxford: Clarendon Press). This position, however, is implausible as a consequence of other intrinsic problems: see H. Radder, ‘Rondom realisme’, Kermis en Methode, Vol. 13 (1989), 295-314, esp. 300-04.
75. D. MacKenzie, ‘From Kwajalein to Armageddon? Testing and the Social Construction of Missile Accuracy’, in D. Gooding, T. Pinch and S. Schaffer (eds), The Uses of Experiment (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989), 409-35.
76. To adapt an example of Isaiah Berlin's.
77. Cf. M. Gallon, ‘Society in the Making: The Study of Technology as a Tool for Sociological Analysis’, in Bijker, Hughes & Pinch (eds), note 7, 83-103
78. B. Latour, ‘Give Me a Laboratory and I will Raise the World’, in Knorr-Cetina & Mulkay (eds), note 1,141-70
79. Latour, note 31
80. J. Law, ‘Technology and Heterogeneous Engineering: The Case of Portuguese Expansion’, in Bijker, Hughes & Pinch (eds), note 7, 111-34.
81. Some authors claim that the actor-network theory may be conveniently combined with a systems approach to technology (e.g. Law, note 67, 112-14; MacKenzie, note 7,196-99
82. for the systems approach, see Hughes, note 36). Such a combination may be accomplished if attention is also paid to the system builders (not only to the system itself), if the boundary between system and environment is seen as flexible, and if the occurrence of conflicts, alternatives, and the like, is taken into account.
83. Law, note 67, 131.
84. Gallon & Latour, note 31, 283.
85. In this section, I make use of the ‘winners-losers’ terminology, which is suggested quite strongly by the military metaphors of the actor-network theory, only for the sake of argument. I do not mean to imply that all developments in science and technology can be adequately characterized in terms of winners and losers.
86. Callon & Latour, note 31, 286.
87. 292, my italics.
88. See Latour, note 31, 100.
89. See Law, note 67. Latour's notion of ‘cycles of accumulation’ is also developed from the perspective of the Princes’ centres of power (Latour, note 31, 219-23); the perspective of the domesticated actors is strikingly absent from these pages.
90. See T.S. Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press, 1970).
91. See Hughes, note 36.
92. Latour, note 31, 60-61.
93. Gallon & Latour, note 31, 292
94. Callon, note 67,93
95. Latour, note 31, 33-34, 121-24, 202-03.
96. See Latour, note 31, 258.
97. Fuller, note 1, ix.
98. See H. Radder, ‘Experiment, Technology and the Intrinsic Connection Between Knowledge and Power’, Social Studies of Science, Vol. 16 (1986), 663-83. In that paper I use the notion of a ‘closed system’ in a quite specific way.
99. Ch. Perrow, Normal Accidents (New York: Basic Books, 1984).
100. See Pels, note 1.
101. In this respect my approach differs considerably from that of some other, recent philosophical critics of constructivism, such as Slezak or Roth and Barrett: cf. P. Slezak, ‘Scientific Discovery by Computer as Empirical Refutation of the Strong Programme’, Social Studies of Science, Vol. 19 (1989), 563-600
102. P. Roth and R. Barrett, ‘Deconstructing Quarks’, Vol. 20 (1990), 579-632.
103. Latour, note 25, 173.