The Political Theory of French Science Studies in Context

Abstract

Science Studies, as developed initially in France attempt to overcome the distinctions between science and society, and correspondingly between the philosophy of science and political and social theory. Science Studies considers the theories and beliefs of scientists political rather than direct reoections of an objective natural world. I consider here Science Studies as a political theory that emerged and has developed in reaction to a particular social and political context, a crisis of technocratic politics in France. Some of the leading contemporary French exponents Science Studies, a group around the journal Cosmopolitiques that is loosely associated with the French Green party, including Bruno Latour and Michel Callon advocate the democratization of science. They have developed explicitly and at length the theoretical political aspects of science studies. I examine here critically this political theory against its social background. I argue that the social and political structure of French science explains the emergence of the descriptive and normative political theories associated with Science Studies. I doubt whether the normative prescriptions that Latour and Callon developed would be sufacient to solve the problems that follow from the monolithic and exclusionary structure of French governance and institutional science. Conversely, I doubt their solutions are useful for other democratic systems and scientiac institutions that do not share the particular problems of France.