Doctoral Dissertation Research: The Impact of Work Practices on the Implementation of Science Policy

关于科学政策的国际协定是依靠国际专业人员向各国代表团提供技术和组织援助的官僚基础设施。由于这些协定的缔约方要求在本国如何执行政策方面具有灵活性，国际工作人员需要保持灵活的心态，对执行国际协定的不同方法持开放态度，同时向各代表团提供公正和政治中立的服务。这项研究调查了国际公务员在科学、科学政策和国际政治之间进行调解时，如何建立和运用这种灵活的心态。该项目的重点是联合国秘书处负责支持《气候公约》运作的专业工作人员。这项研究将采用人种学方法，揭示《气候公约》工作人员的正式和非正式工作做法如何影响形成政策的体制环境。除了对科学政策研究的影响外，该项目的成果还将促进对政策人类学、官僚文化人类学以及国际机构在全球治理中的作用的理解。该项目的博士生将在为期12个月的时间里在《气候公约》的三个工作单位实习和轮换。《气候公约》工作人员促进从科学机构到外交官的信息流动，撰写关于科学和政策的技术报告，会见气候协定缔约方，协调沟通，监督审计程序，并在谈判会议期间向代表提供程序援助等职责。将通过参与者观察、半结构化访谈和审查内部文件收集定性数据，以了解和解释《气候公约》工作人员的工作方式、他们对这项工作的理解，以及他们的工作做法如何影响更广泛的联合国决策和执行进程。定性分析技术，包括文本分析、描述性和解释性话语分析以及语境分析，将被应用于数据，以揭示有意义的概念、类别和关系。这项研究的结果将提供概念框架和数据，用来了解关于缓解和可持续发展努力的国际政策制定的微观动态。通过阐明国际协议的形成和实施过程，这些发现将对政治行为者、政策制定者及其工作人员和政策研究人员具有价值。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

International agreements concerning science policy are bureaucratic infrastructures that rely on international professional staff who provide technical and organizational assistance to the national delegations. As the parties to these agreements demand flexibility in how policies are to be carried out in their countries, the international staff need to maintain a flexible mindset, being open to different approaches for implementing international agreements while at the same time providing impartial and politically neutral service to the delegations. This research investigates the ways that international civil servants establish and exercise this flexible mindset as they mediate between science, science policy, and international politics. This project is focused on the professional staff of the United Nations Secretariat charged with supporting operation of the UNFCCC. The research will employ ethnographic methods to uncover how the formal and informal work practices of UNFCCC staff impact the institutional environment in which policy is formed. In addition to its implications for the study of science policy, the results of this project will advance understanding of the anthropology of policy, the anthropology of bureaucratic cultures, and the role of international institutions in global governance. The doctoral student on this project, will intern and rotate among three UNFCCC staff units over a 12-month period. UNFCCC staff facilitate information flow from scientific bodies to diplomats, write technical reports on science and policy, meet with parties to the climate agreement, coordinate communication, oversee audit procedures, and provide procedural assistance to delegates during negotiation meetings, among other duties. Qualitative data will be collected via participant observation, semi-structured interviews, and review of internal documents, to understand and explain the ways that the UNFCCC staff work, their understanding of that work, and the ways in which their work practices affect the larger United Nations policy making and implementation processes. Qualitative analysis techniques including text analysis, descriptive and interpretational discourse analysis, and context analysis will be applied to the data to uncover meaningful concepts, categories, and relationships. The results of the study will provide conceptual frameworks and data with which to understand the micro-dynamics of international policy making on mitigation and sustainable development efforts. By illuminating the processes by which international agreements are formed and implemented, the findings will be of value to political actors, policy makers and their staffs, and policy researchers.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.