Dissertation Research: Ecological "Technological Enthusiasm": Tensions at the intersection of science, technology and values

这项科学技术研究论文改进补助金将为博士生的研究费用提供资金支持研究基于生态工程原理的生态技术的创新和采用的学生。本课题的研究将进一步发展对生态现代化进程的分析和批判。实地研究的具体目标是：1）识别和描述个人参与生态工程生态技术创新和采用的原因以及他们对这些领域的目标和愿望; 2）确定和描述生态技术和生态工程定义的差异和变化;识别和描述参与者在创新和采用生态技术方面的差异和紧张关系。资金将用于支持参与者观察和半结构化访谈，以收集与创新和采用生态技术有关的个人想法、动机和价值观的数据。本案例研究将利用生态工程废水系统的生态技术作为研究地点选择的统一框架。研究领域的网站和主题将代表一系列的参与：1）学术研究人员; 2）不以营利为目的的创新者; 3）以营利为目的的承包商和4）技术采用者。生态现代化理论预测，绿色技术总体上将在产业、社会和政策中占据更重要的地位。当这种情况发生在绿色技术上时，生态技术的意义和价值可能会丧失。也有理论认为，这些新技术的整合过程将有利于补充主流实践的技术，而不是更激进的替代品（Hess 2003），这种部分采用可能有利于资本主义的关注，不利于替代价值观和理性的表达（Guldbrandsen and Holland 2001）。本研究将探讨这些批评，通过调查的变化和紧张局势，发生在创新和采用生态工程废水技术。这项工作带来了环境人类学和科学技术研究（STS）之间的和解。环境人类学家在他们的研究中包含的技术主要集中在与技术相反的环境运动上（例如Berglund 2001）。同样，STS从业者也研究了替代或适当技术的采用，但这些通常是从历史或社会学的角度进行的（例如Mol 2003）。这项研究推动了环境人类学对环境运动的更丰富的探索，也将人类学对个人真实的体验的关注带到了替代技术的STS分析中。这项研究的第二个智力价值是它愿意解决在接受人类学家研究的呼吁（Nader 1974）以及人类学家从事多地点研究的呼吁（Marcus 1995）中所涉及的挑战。这项工作的第三个优点是它结合了理论关注与一个更“积极的面向STS”（伍德豪斯2002）。正是这种积极的取向使其适用于更广泛的应用。本研究的应用目标是促进生态工程领域发展中的张力点的识别和讨论。这项研究解决了生态技术从业者自己确定的问题和关切（Kangas 2004）。本文的研究对当前生态工程学科的形式化和边界设置具有一定的借鉴意义。

This Science and Technology Studies Dissertation Improvement Grant will provide funds to support research costs for a Ph.D. student who is examining the innovation and adoption of ecotechnologies based on ecological engineering Principles. The topic will be studied to further develop the analysis and critique of the process of ecological modernization. The specific goals of the field research are: 1) To identify and describe the reasons individuals became involved in the innovation and adoption of ecologically engineered ecotechnologies and their goals and aspirations for these fields; 2) To identify and describe differences and changes in the definitions of ecotechnologies and ecological engineering and 3) To identify and describe differences and tensions amongst the participants in the innovation and adoption of ecotechnologies. Funds will support participant observation and semi-structured interviews in order to collect data on individuals' ideas, motivations and values associated with the innovation and adoption of ecotechnologies. This case study will utilize the ecotechnology of ecological engineered wastewater systems as the unifying frame through which research sites are selected. The research field sites and subjects will represent a range of involvement: 1) Academic researchers; 2) Not-for-Profit innovators; 3) For-profit contractors and 4) The technology adopters. Ecological modernization theory predicts that green technologies in general will be moving toward a more central position in industry, society, and policy. As this occurs for a green technology, aspects of the meaning and values ascribed to the ecotechnology could be lost. It is also theorized that the process of incorporation of these new technologies will favor the technologies that are complementary to mainstream practice over more radical alternatives (Hess 2003), and that such partial adoption can favor the concerns of capitalism, to the detriment of the expression of alternative values and rationalities (Guldbrandsen and Holland 2001). This research will explore these critiques through the investigation of the changes and tensions that are occurring in the innovation and adoption of ecologically engineered wastewater technologies. This work brings a rapprochement between Environmental Anthropology and Science and Technology Studies (STS). Environmental anthropologists' inclusion of technology in their studies has largely centered on environmental movements in opposition to technologies (e.g. Berglund 2001). Similarly, STS practitioners have looked at the adoption of alternative or appropriate technologies, but these are often done from a historical or sociological perspective (e.g. Mol 2003). This research pushes environmental anthropology to a richer exploration of environmental movements, as well as bringing the anthropological concern for the real experiences of individuals to the STS analysis of alternative technology. The second intellectual merit of this research is its willingness to tackle the challenges involved in accepting both the call for anthropologists to study-up (Nader 1974), as well as the call for anthropologists to engage in multi-sited research (Marcus 1995). The third merit of this work is its conjoining of theoretical concerns with a more "activist oriented STS" (Woodhouse 2002). It is this activist orientation that lends itself to broader application. The applied goal of this research is to facilitate the identification and discussion of points of tension in the development of the field of ecological engineering. This research addresses questions and concerns that ecotechnology practitioners themselves identify (Kangas 2004). This research will be especially helpful in the current formalization and boundary setting in the academic discipline of ecological engineering.