Collaborative Research: Participatory Technology Assessment and Cultures of Expertise in the U.S. Federal Government

该奖项支持一个研究项目，该项目研究在联邦机构决策背景下使专业知识民主化的努力。它调查了参与式技术评估是否以及如何改变了NASA、NOAA和DOE的专家文化。人们对参与式技术评估知之甚少，参与式技术评估是一种公众参与活动，不同的利益攸关方群体（包括公民组织、国家系统和非政府机构）与技术科学家和技术专家群体互动，影响机构决策过程以及技术专家对普通公民的看法。联邦政府机构的案例研究及其参与性技术评估做法将在本项目中开发，有可能告知许多类型的技术专家如何在实践中规划和实施此类评估;它将为改善未来的合作提供实际经验教训。除了学术出版物和会议报告，这项研究的结果将用于制定一个最佳实践手册，专门从事公众参与和政府机构之间的边界组织的有效合作。研究结果将在华盛顿的亚利桑那州科学政策成果联合会系列研讨会上公布，该联合会在吸引地方和联邦机构、非政府组织、以及对研究的实际应用感兴趣的学者。本研究项目将结合使用-深入访谈和文件分析，以评估参与性技术评估是否以及如何导致专家对公众意见和知识，包括专家如何看待和实施决策中的公众参与做法。该研究团队可以接触到美国联邦政府背景下的技术专家决策者。因此，这项研究将能够解决公众参与和专门知识文献中的基本知识差距。它将提供一个比较，应用帐户的联邦机构专家的意见，他们参与通过，框架和实施参与式技术评估和评估结果纳入决策过程的整合。它将揭示特定的联邦机构专家和专家组是如何受到评估过程的影响和挑战的，它将探讨这种评估在多大程度上为技术专家决策者提供了一种反思性学习工具。它也可以用来证实公众参与和专业文献中的现有理论，这些理论仅仅假设通过公众参与活动改善决策过程和科技文化变革。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并被认为值得通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估来支持。

This award supports a research project that studies efforts to democratize expertise in the context of federal agency decision-making. It investigates whether and how participatory technology assessments have change expert cultures at NASA, NOAA, and DOE. Very little is known about how participatory technology assessments, which are public engagement exercises where different stakeholder groups (including citizen organizations, state systems, and non-government agencies) interact with technical scientist and technical expert groups, impact agency decision-making processes and the ways that technical experts think about lay citizens. The case studies of federal government agencies and their participatory technology assessment practices that are to be developed in this project have the potential to inform how numerous types of technical experts plan and implement such assessments in practice; it will result in practical lessons learned for improving future collaborations. Beyond academic publications and conference presentations, the results of this study will be used to develop a best practices handbook for effective collaboration between boundary organizations that specialize in public engagement and government agencies. Results will be presented at the Arizona State Consortium for Science Policy Outcomes seminar series in Washington, DC, which has a long history of engaging local and federal agencies, NGOs, and academics interested in the practical application of research.This research project will use a combination of in-depth interviews and document analysis to assess whether and how participatory technology assessments lead to reflexive changes in expert views on public input and knowledge, including how experts perceive and implement public engagement practices in decision making. The research team has access to technical expert decision-makers in the U.S. federal government context. As a result, the study will be able to address fundamental knowledge gaps in the public engagement and expertise literature. It will provide a comparative, applied account of federal agency expert reflections on their participation in the adoption, framing, and implementation of participatory technology assessment and the integration of assessment results into decision-making processes. It will bring to light how particular federal agency experts and expert groups are influenced by and challenge the assessment process, and it will explore the extent to which such assessments serve the role of a reflexive learning device for technical expert decision-makers. It may also serve to substantiate existing theories in the public engagement and expertise literature that merely postulates improvements in decision making processes and techno-scientific cultural change through public engagement exercises.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.