Narrative as a resource for inclusive governance: a UK–Brazil comparison of public responses to nanotechnology

ABSTRACT

In this article we examine the role of narrative as a resource for developing inclusive governance frameworks, principally through an examination of two public deliberation experiments, conducted concurrently in the UK and Brazil, that took place prior to the rise of interest in responsible innovation. While in the UK we witness a (partial) rhetorical move in science governance, from a top-down technocratic model to a more deliberative model in which public engagement assumes a central role, in Brazil the political contestations over particular technologies failed to gain political traction. A contrast is drawn between the narratives that publics draw upon in responding to nanotechnology between UK and Brazilian publics. We draw on these differences to argue that situated narratives of epistemic inclusion need to be addressed at the outset of adapting any responsible innovation framework to best align its goals and practices with the context of implementation.

KEYWORDS:

• Public engagement with science
• narrative
• responsible innovation
• nanotechnology
• epistemic inclusion

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes on contributors

Phil Macnaghten is a Personal Professor in the Knowledge, Technology, and Innovation (KTI) Group of Wageningen University. His work focuses on frameworks of responsible innovation, the governance of socially controversial technologies and the politics of anticipation.

Julia S. Guivant is full professor at the Department of Sociology and Political Science, Federal University of Santa Catarina, Brazil. Her main areas of expertise are in environmental sociology, risk analysis, sociology of food and sociology of scientific knowledge.

Notes

1 Arguably ‘frontier spirit’ is not universally a psycho-social emotion whereas ‘exploration’ might be said to be so. Frontier is a culturally specific term to geographically expanding cultures, for example colonial projects. Nevertheless, this is the term used by Latour which may be apt given the proximity between Enlightenment thinking and the spirit of colonialism. We are grateful to an anonymous reviewer for this point.

2 There is scope for research to expand on this point: to develop a more elaborate comparative analysis of the meanings of innovation R&D, and the intersections between these and cultural levels of alienation/non-alienation from political/civic/community processes. We are grateful to an anonymous reviewer for this point.