Policing the Skies: Environmental Governmentality, State Science and the British Atmosphere.

在当代人们对气候变化、臭氧层遭到破坏以及与空气污染有关的各种健康问题感到关切的背景下，从来没有比这更重要的时刻来了解大气层中正在发生的事情。但是我们怎么知道大气的化学平衡和不平衡呢？该项目的基础是这样一种信念，即为了了解今天可获得的大气知识的类型，我们需要对形成形式和性质以及大气监测程序的科学和政治制度进行历史考察。该项目专门以英国为重点，描绘了大气污染监测的出现以及科学突破和政治倡议，使监测成为可能。该项目的目标是：-揭示历史上使大气污染知识的产生成为可能的技术和政治过程。-检查国家空气监测过程中出现的政治和地理阻力。-揭示英国出现的各种替代的、当地的方式来了解和监测空气污染事件。该项目主要对人类社会和大气之间的联系感兴趣。大气层体现了各种社会、经济和生态系统的重要交汇点，但它的研究历史上一直是物理学家的专属领域。越来越多在艺术和人文科学领域工作的学者开始揭示改变氛围的社会经济过程，以及对氛围的了解如何与一系列文化传统和政治程序联系在一起。分析还涉及科学实践的历史演变，以及政治要求和技术突破如何塑造科学发展。在英国大气层的背景下，该项目描绘了自1891年《公共卫生法案》以来，为建立空气污染监测科学而进行的持续斗争。通过重新审视早期气象学家和烟雾官的描述，他们被赋予了污染观测的责任，这个项目揭示了大气观测科学发展的实际障碍。该研究项目还考虑了国家当局和政府部门在打造英国国家大气监测科学方面的作用。通过对不同政府部门记录的研究，分析表明，从20世纪20年代开始，英国开始出现一种新的日益广泛的空间监测制度。分析的最终结果是对英国第一次全国空气污染调查(1961-1971)的运作进行了考虑，结果显示，英国的国家空气污染登记在一定程度上是地方科学倡议和机构发展的产物，这些成果是在地方监测点和监测站实现的，而不是中央国家计划的胜利。通过绘制英国大气监测国家科学的兴起图，该项目揭示了大气知识的当代登记在一定程度上是昔日政治当局的目标和理性的遗产。通过这种方式，分析揭示了现有的大气知识是如何受到政府当局监测愿望的制约，而不是反映科学研究或社会团体的需要。这项工作的价值在于它表明需要更广泛的方式监测和了解大气层，这些方式可以满足不同地理位置的更广泛的社会需求。\

In the context of contemporary concern over climate change, the destruction of the Ozone Layer and the various health problems associated with air pollution there has never been a more important time to know what is going on in the atmosphere. But how do we know about the chemical balances and imbalances of the atmosphere? This project is based upon the belief that in order to understand the types of atmospheric knowledge, which are available today we need to take an historical look at the sciences and political regimes which have shaped the form and nature and atmospheric monitoring procedures. Focusing specifically on the UK, this project charts the emergence of atmospheric pollution monitoring and the scientific breakthroughs and political initiatives, which have made increasingly national patterns of monitoring possible.The projects objectives are:- To reveal the technological and political processes which have historically enabled the production of knowledge of atmospheric pollution.- To examine the political and geographical resistances which have emerged to national air monitoring processes.- To reveal the variety of alternative, local ways which have emerged to knowing and monitoring air pollution events in Britain.This project is primarily interested in the links between human society and the atmosphere. The atmosphere embodies an important meeting point of various social, economic and ecological systems, but its study has historically been the preserve of the physical scientist. Increasingly scholars working within the Arts and Humanities have started to uncover the socio-economic processes through which the atmosphere is transformed, and how knowledge of the atmosphere is connected to a whole range of cultural traditions and political procedures. Analysis is also concerned with the historical evolution of scientific practice and how scientific development is shaped by both political requirements and technological breakthroughs. In the context of the British atmosphere this project charts how since the 1891 Public Health Act there has been an ongoing struggle to forge a science of air pollution monitoring. By revisiting the accounts of early meteorologists and smoke officers who were given responsibility for pollution observation this project reveals the practical barriers, which existed to the development of a science of atmospheric observation. This research project also considers the role of state authorities and governmental departments in forging a national science of atmospheric monitoring in the UK. Through the study of the records of different government departments, analysis shows how a new regime of increasingly broad spatial monitoring started to emerge in the UK form the 1920s onwards. Analysis culminates with a consideration of the operation of the Britain's first National Air Pollution Survey (1961-1971), and reveals that far from representing a triumph of central state planning, that national registers of air pollution in the UK are in part a product of the local scientific initiatives and institutional developments which were achieved at local monitoring sites and stations. By charting the rise of a state science of atmospheric monitoring in the UK this project reveals how contemporary registers of atmospheric knowledge are, in part, the legacies of the goals and rationalities of erstwhile political authorities. In this way analysis exposes how rather than reflecting the needs of scientific research or social communities, available knowledge of the atmosphere is structured and constrained by the monitoring desires of governmental authorities. The value of this exercise derives from the ways in which it suggests the need for a broader range of ways of monitoring and knowing the atmosphere, which can serve a much broader range of social needs in diverse geographical locations. \