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Department of Geography

Staff Profile

Publication details for Professor Phil Macnaghten

Macnaghten, P.M., Kearnes, M.B. & Wynne, B. Nanotechnology, governance, and public deliberation: What role for the Social Sciences? Science Communication. 2005;27:268-291.
  • Publication type: Journal papers: academic
  • ISSN/ISBN: 1075-5470, 1552-8545
  • DOI: 10.1177/1075547005281531
  • Keywords: Nanotechnology, Governance, Upstream public engagement, Imaginaries.
  • View online: Online version
  • Durham research online: DRO record

Author(s) from Durham

Abstract

In this article we argue that nanotechnology represents an extraordinary opportunity to build in a robust role for the social sciences in a technology that remains at an early, and hence undetermined, stage of development. We examine policy dynamics in both the United States and United Kingdom aimed at both opening up, and closing down, the role of the social sciences in nanotechnologies. We then set out a prospective agenda for the social sciences and its potential in the future shaping of nanotechnology research and innovation processes. The emergent, undetermined nature of nanotechnologies calls for an open, experimental, and interdisciplinary model of social science research.

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