Futuring, visioneering, anticipation: Knowledge Objects in the governance of emerging technologies

Der Palacio de Miramar in Donastia - San Sebastián. The most beautyful place for a Summer Schooll
Der Palacio de Miramar in Donastia – San Sebastián. The most beautyful place for a Summer Schooll
Summerschool mit Blick auf die Bucht von Donastia
Summerschool mit Blick auf die Bucht von Donastia

Schaper-Rinkel, P. (30.07.2014) Futuring, visioneering, anticipation:  Knowledge Objects in the governance of emerging technologies, Keynote lecture at the Interdisciplinary International Graduate Summer School, „The Regulative Capacity of Knowledge Objects: Opening the Black Box of Knowledge Governance„, University of the Basque Country UPV/EHU, Donostia‐San Sebastian, Spain, 28.07.14 – 01.08.14

Abstract:

Nanotechnology, Converging Technologies, Human Enhancement, Climate Change, Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI) indicates/d future change. Those involved in governance imagine and anticipate future technologies and future infrastructures as solutions for social and economic problems and nowadays in response to ‘Societal Challenges’.   Future echnologies are constructed as future knowledge objects to become subject and object of the future-oriented governance of science, technology and innovation.

Anticipating future technologies and future innovation means to anticipate specific societal futures and to anticipate governance frameworks to govern social and technological change. We can observe a variety of governance practices how actors in science, society and policy try to shape and control future by imagining and anticipating futures. Concepts/constructs/knowledge objects such as nanotechnology in the 1990s or responsible research and innovation (RRI) today are ‘boundary objects’. As an ideal type of fictional future technology, it serves as a means of communicating and cooperating symbolically in future-oriented governance.

This presentation will specifically focus on the exploration of the practices of anticipating, futuring and/or visioneering of future knowledge objects in governance. I will investigate how the practices and processes of generating and specifying knowledge objects are essential for the governance of specific fields such as nanotechnology, converging technologies and Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI).