James Wickham
Something New in Old Europe? Innovations in EU-funded
Social Research
Abstract
This paper
investigates whether EU research programmes have led to
innovations in European social research. This is based on an
assessment of a group of EU-funded projects on the changing nature
of work in Europe. EU-funded projects have contributed to the
creation of a European social space for European researchers, but
at the cost of consolidating English as the lingua franca of
European social research. Such projects tend to involve
heterogeneous research actors and are oriented towards policy
issues. To some extent they are therefore representative of a
'Mode 2' form of knowledge production. More clearly, they have
ensured that social research about Europe is no longer simply
comparative research. The new EU Sixth Framework Programme on RTD
will undermine many of these achievements through its focus on
conventional definitions of 'excellence' and the insistence on
large-scale research instruments.
Rolf Lidskog and Göran
Sundqvist
From consensus to credibility
Abstract
The
development of consensual science has greatly influenced the
international environmental negotiation processes. This is not
least the case for the Convention on Long-range Transboundary Air
Pollution (CLRTAP). Negotiators as well as regime analysts regard
CLRTAP as a successful example of how scientists have succeeded in
influencing international policy making through consensus-building
strategies. Drawing on Ulrich Beck's work on reflexive
scientization and the concept of 'stage management' from the field
of the Sociology of Scientific Knowledge (SSK), this paper
critically analyzes the role of science in the regulation of
transboundary air pollution. It discusses the consensus-building
strategies developed by scientists as well as contemporary
strategies for making science matter in regulative work. It is
argued that scientific credibility is crucial for attracting
political and public attention, but that credibility does not
necessarily have to be based on scientific consensus. The
challenge for science is not so much to create consensus but to
strengthen its credibility by elaborating new relations with its
stakeholders.
Michael Murray
Strategic spatial planning on the island of Ireland
Abstract
The central
argument in this article is that recent advances in strategic
spatial planning on the island of Ireland have been considerably
enhanced through the medium of the European Spatial Development
Perspective. This has provided a shared technical vocabulary and
an imperative to imagine possibilities which transcend the border
between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland to a greater
and lesser extent, depending on the sensitivities of the actors
concerned. Particular attention is given to the role played by
very different participatory processes in helping to shape these
spatial agendas. The paper concludes by identifying an
action-oriented commitment to sustainable development as the key
strategic choice in advancing the logic of territorial
interdependence.
Jacques Lolive and Anne
Tricot
The emergence of an Alpine environmental expertise
Abstract
This
article reports on the findings of research carried out on
conflicts concerning major transport infrastructure projects in
the Southern Alps. These conflicts were analyzed as delineating
the gradual emergence of an environmental expertise network.
Rather than fighting the administration and/or the transport
operator in the field of transport, some opponents try to relocate
the expertise into the field of the environment so as to catch the
experts in the different administrations off guard. This resulting
Alpine environmental expertise
is based on the constitution of trans-Alpine associative networks
and the emergence of a constantly more supportive and structuring
notion: sustainable development. In this article, we analyze the
manner in which this notion is diffused and how it gradually
builds up its definition in the course of action. The Alpine
Agreement plays a major role in this operationalization: it
constitutes a multilateral semantic point of reference for a
variable Alpine policy and has influenced both major trans-Alpine
associative networks and official French land transport policy.
Steen Leleur
SCOPE: an Integrated Framework for Multi-attribute Decision
Making
Abstract
This
article presents an integrated framework for multi-attribute
decision making named SCOPE (System for Combined Planning and
Evaluation) that was developed to assess infrastructure policy
initiatives--in complex decision environments. The framework
comprises scanning as well as assessment issues that are supported
by a methodology of both a systemic and a systematic type.
Specific use is made of operational research methods such as
critical systems heuristics, scenario technique, stakeholder
analysis and multi-attribute decision making (MADM). To deal with
issues of complexity and ambiguity, planning is redefined as being
a systemic endeavour embedded in multi-methodology and
reflection-in-practice. The article addresses the purpose,
background and principles of systemic planning, and exemplifies
the SCOPE process with reference to the Řresund Fixed Link.
