Civilian Control of Science
On March 18, 2017, First HSE Research Battle took place at the Key Tech Hub. The event was organised by HSE students together with the Polytechnic Museum and the Student Initiative Support Centre. Kirill Makarov, a student of Master’s programme 'Comparative Social Research' and intern researcher from the Laboratory for Economics of Innovation, participated in the contest with a speech devoted to the issues of interaction between scientists and society in the context of developing effective measures of scientific and technical policy in the 21st century.
Kirill Makarov’s speech — from 25 minutes
At the beginning of the presentation, Kirill Makarov noted that the absence of any interaction between scientists and ordinary people, mutual mistrust, misunderstanding and lack of cooperation are unfortunately a typical situation for many countries. How should scientists build a dialogue with ordinary people and what for? How to bring scientific knowledge to society? Kirill Makarov tries to find answers to these questions in his master's research "Science to the People: Search for Determinants of Public Engagement with Science".
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| Кирилл Макаров |
First of all, we should understand that scientists do not work in an isolated world - their discoveries, decisions and achievements directly affect everyday life of many people. At the same time, all the risks associated with technological development of the world are borne by ordinary citizens, whose opinion, as a rule, is ignored in making decisions in this field.
Lack of dialogue between scientists and the population, ignoring expert knowledge of people lead to the fact that population’s attitude towards scientists and their work remains skeptical, wherefore science does not fully perform the function of improving the quality of life of society.
But are there any precedents and mechanisms that allow ordinary citizens to influence the formation of scientific and technology policy?
Kirill Makarov cited the example of European countries, where approximately 30% of the population of a particular country have some experience of participation in the scientific policy development or have influence on it. The bulk of these people is educated, interested in science or has a scientific background. Mechanisms can be very different - from debates with scientists and politicians, signing various petitions, participating in demonstrations and pickets in order to attract government’s attention to the point of view of ordinary citizens. It is clear that citizens are most actively involved in the dialogue with scientists in developed democratic countries.
It is significant that there are citizens who influence the scientific policy not because of their desire to improve it, but because of the fear of something new, unused and frightening. For these people, an attempt to exercise personal control over science is a wish to make scientific innovations and its risks more predictable.
In any case, interaction between science and society is an indispensable component of scientific discoveries and achievements because theoretically perfect solutions do not always take into account local context and, therefore, fail.
This is where citizens come into play. They enter into a dialogue with scientists to make science useful and productive.
Under HSE Research Battle, students discuss their research without Powerpoint having only 10 minutes. Young talented scientists are prepared for the show, after which the jury and the audience choose the best speaker of five speakers who will be able to compete in the final for the main prize - a study-grant for a semester at a European university.
By Karina Zagitova