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KSS'2007 >
このアイテムの引用には次の識別子を使用してください:
http://hdl.handle.net/10119/4100
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| タイトル: | Enabling Knowledge : Is Liberty a Daughter of Knowledge? |
| 著者: | Stehr, Nico |
| 発行日: | Nov-2007 |
| 出版者: | JAIST Press |
| 抄録: | The theme I would like to explore in this presentation concern the multiple linkages between knowledge, civil society, governance, and democracy. I will place this general set of questions into the context of whether or not the these linkages are co-determined by a an enabling knowledgeability of modern actors -- stressing growing chances of reflexive cooperation in civil society organizations, social movements and perhaps a growing influence of larger segments of society on democratic regimes. But my specific purpose has to be more modest. Access to and the command of knowledge is stratified. I will explore three of these barriers and hurdles of access to knowledge and ask: (1) Is it possible to reconcile expertise and civil society, (2) it is conceivable to reconcile civil society and knowledge as a private good; finally, I will ask, are the social sciences and the humanities a source of enabling knowledge? In an essay in the New York Review of Books (November 18, 2004, p. 38), the molecular biologist Richard Lewontin maintains that “the knowledge required for political rationality, once available to the masses, is now in the possession of a specially educated elite, a situation that creates a series of tensions and contradictions in the operation of representative democracy.” Has therefore the shared optimism by the Philosophers of the French Enlightenment, in particular of Condorcet about the role of knowledge not only in overcoming poverty, violence and ignorance but also in building a sustainable democratic society been destroyed (cf. Jones, 2004:16-63)? By the same token, the English chemistry Nobel laureate Harry Kroto in a recent opinion piece in the Guardian (May 22, 2007, Education 1-2) denounces the UK government for wrecking British science and science education. And all of this in the face the “need for a general population with a satisfactory understanding of science and technology [that] never has been greater.” Kroto who is now researching and teaching in the United States (and not in England any more) adds, “we live in a world economically, socially, and culturally dependent on science not only functioning well, but being wisely applied.” Moreover, in light of the growing socialization of the production of scientific knowledge, as Immanuel Wallerstein, to cite a social scientist, observes, all but a few individuals are deprived of the “capacity for individual rational judgment either about the quality of the evidence proffered or about the tightness of the theoretical reasoning applied to the analysis of the data. The ‘harder’ the science, the truer this is” (Wallerstein, 2004:8). Richard Lewontin's, Harry Kroto's and Immanuel Wallerstein's skeptical comments about the increasing usage of contemporary, especially natural scientific knowledge, not only by governments but as a tool of politics (cf. Pielke, 2007), and yet, the extent to which ordinary citizens apparently are robbed of the ability to rationally enter into discourse about modern science and technology, conveniently sum up the questions about the multiple linkages between knowledge and democracy I want to explore in this lecture. Is it indeed the case that we cannot escape the dilemma of deferring in our judgments to self-selected communities of experts? On the surface, questions of the relations between knowledgeability and democracy are not a widely discussed set of issues discussed head-on in contemporary social science. However, if one extends one's perspective to what are mediated relations between knowledge, the economy, civil society and democratic regimes, one constantly encounters its tracks; for example, under the heading of cultural capital and political franchise, access to educational institutions and the social distribution of knowledge, the competitiveness of nations, or social identities and political inclusiveness to mention but a few issues on the agenda of social science and politics today. I will begin with a rather broad set of questions and claims: As Max Horkheimer emphasized -- in contrast to Karl Marx -- justice or equity and freedom do not mutually support each other. Does this also apply to democracy and knowledge? Or is knowledge a democratizer? Is the progress of knowledge, especially rapid advances a burden on democracy, civil society and the capacity of the individual to assert her will? And if there is a contradiction between knowledge and democratic processes, is this a new development or is the advance of liberal democracies co-determined by the joint forces of knowledge and democratic political conduct enabling one to claim that civil society if not democracy is the daughter of knowledge? |
| 記述: | The original publication is available at JAIST Press http://www.jaist.ac.jp/library/jaist-press/index.html
Proceedings of KSS'2007 : The Eighth International Symposium on Knowledge and Systems Sciences : November 5-7, 2007, [Ishikawa High-Tech Conference Center, Nomi, Ishikawa, JAPAN]
Organized by: Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology |
| 言語: | ENG |
| URI: | http://hdl.handle.net/10119/4100 |
| ISBN: | 9784903092072 |
| 出現コレクション: | KSS'2007
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