Scholars Award: The Coming of Age: The Formation of the Global Science and Policy of Aging

理解全球科学和政策领域的形成和动态是很重要的，因为领域决定了提出和回答的各种问题，决定了谁参与决策，决定了谁从过程和框架中获益或受损。对全球科学和政策领域的研究相对较少，现有的研究通常假设知识和政策是从全球北方流向全球其他地区的。最近的研究表明，这一框架是不健全的，并且忽略了思想和人员在多个方向上的重要交流，包括从全球南方到全球北方。本研究项目在这一点上进行了干预，通过对老龄化科学和政策形成的案例研究，研究了全球科学和政策领域是如何通过多个机构、国家和州外层面的关键交换点形成的。更具体地说，本研究通过解决三个关键问题，探讨了老龄化科学和政策是如何在地方、社区、国家和全球层面形成的：1)具体的政策制定者和科学家如何以及为什么构想和塑造了有关老龄化及其政策的知识；2)特定地理区域如何以及为什么成为围绕老龄化的科学和政策干预场所；3)哪些关键的竞技场和猜想在场的形成中发挥了最大的作用。证据来自档案数据和国际机构和非政府组织的现有文件、对科学出版物的分析以及对专家和政策制定者的深入访谈，以探讨这些问题。这项研究通过展示政治和科学如何交叉产生跨意识形态和政治环境互动的跨国专家网络，有助于从社会科学的角度理解新科学领域的出现。它推进了关于领域如何演变、获得可信度和从全球政策议程中退下来的社会科学知识，并在当代政策中留下了持久的遗产。在全球范围内，人口的迅速老龄化正在以深刻而普遍的方式改变着社会。人口老龄化的社会和政治影响引起了国家和国际治理组织、科学界和医学研究人员的关注。已经建立了新的政策干预措施和科学研究领域来解决这些问题，对已经并继续影响老龄化科学和政策的规范、假设、体制转折点的了解，在没有进行有价值干预所需的比较知识的情况下进行活动。这项研究将解决这一差距，并提供有关关键领域和结合点的知识，这些领域和结合点已经或可能在未来的老龄化科学和政策中发挥重要的因果作用。研究成果通过编写和提供课程材料、向非政府组织和其他机构作简报和介绍以及通过学术出版物传播。

The formation and dynamics of global science and policy fields are important to understand because fields shape the kinds of questions that are asked and answered, who participates in decisionmaking, and who acquires benefits or is harmed by processes and frameworks. Studies of global science and policy fields are relatively rare, and those that exist have typically assumed that knowledge and policy flows are from the global north to other parts of the globe. Recent research has suggested that this framework is unsound, and misses the critical exchanges of ideas and people that operate in multiple directions, including from the global south to the global north. This research project intervenes at this point, examining how global science and policy fields are formed through critical exchange points at multiple institutional, state, and extra-state levels, using a case study of the formation of the science and policy of aging. More specifically, this study investigates how the science and policy of aging took form at the local, community, nation and global level, by addressing three critical questions: 1) how and why specific policymakers and scientists have conceived of and shaped knowledge about aging and its policies; 2) how and why specific geographic areas came to be sites of scientific and policy intervention around aging; 3)what critical arenas and conjuctures played the greatest role in field formation. Evidence is drawn from archival data and existing documents from international institutions and NGOs, analysis of scientific publications, and in-depth interviews with experts and policymakers to explore these questions.This study contributes to social scientific understandings of the emergence of new science fields by showing how politics and science intersect to produce transnational networks of experts who can interact across ideological and political settings. It advances social scientific knowledge of how fields evolve, gain credibility, and ebb from global policy agendas, with persistent legacies in contemporary policies.Around the globe, the rapid aging of populations is transforming societies in profound and pervasive ways. The social and political implications of an aged population have raised concerns in national and international governance organizations, in scientific communities, and among medical researchers. New policy interventions and fields of scientific study have been established to address these concerns, knowledge of the norms, assumptions, institutional junctures that have and continue to shape the science and policy of aging, activities are undertaken without the comparative knowledge necessary to make valuable interventions. This study will address that gap, and provide knowledge about the critical arenas and conjunctures that have played and may play important causal roles in future aging science and policy. Research results are disseminated through the development and delivery of course materials, briefings and presentations to NGOs and other institutions, and through scholarly publications.