{"id":37615,"date":"2024-09-13T15:43:52","date_gmt":"2024-09-13T13:43:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.fondazionebassetti.org\/?p=37615"},"modified":"2024-09-13T15:45:28","modified_gmt":"2024-09-13T13:45:28","slug":"thoughts_from_the_easst_4s_conference","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.fondazionebassetti.org\/en\/live_archive\/2024\/09\/thoughts_from_the_easst_4s_conference","title":{"rendered":"Thoughts from the EASST 4s Conference"},"content":{"rendered":"

Conference Theme: Making and doing transformations<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

In July I attended the quadrennial joint meeting of the European Association for the Study of Science and Technology (EASST) and the Society for Social Studies of Science (4S). This (the 11th quadrennial\u00a0joint conference) was hosted by the\u00a0Athena Institute<\/a>\u00a0at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam (VU).<\/p>\n

EASST<\/a> is the European Association for the Study of Science and Technology. Established in 1981 it represents academics and researchers in the fields of science and technology studies (STS), the social analysis of innovation and related areas of knowledge such as Responsible Innovation. Much like Responsible Innovation, it brings together a variety of disciplines and many of its members have qualifications in both natural science\/engineering and social sciences.<\/p>\n

Founding VIRI<\/a> member Maja Horst is current EASST President.<\/p>\n

The Society for Social Studies of Science<\/a> (4S) is an international, nonprofit association founded in 1975 that fosters interdisciplinary and engaged scholarship in social studies of science, technology, and medicine (STS). 4s aims to foster interdisciplinary and engaged scholarship in social studies of science, technology, and medicine across the globe.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Another founding VIRI member Marko Monteiro is a member of the 4s Council, following in the footsteps of other friends of the Foundation Brian Wynne<\/a>, Sheila Jasanoff<\/a> and the late Bruno Latour<\/a>.<\/p>\n

This was a huge conference with 3700 participants, many of whom will be well known to our regular readers. Other VIRI members who either convened panels or presented papers include Jack Stilgoe, Stevienna de Saille, Andoni Ibarra, Christopher Coenen, Kornelia Konrad, Phil Macnaghten and Hannot Rodrigues.<\/p>\n

Long-time Foundation collaborators Federico Neresini<\/a>, Giuseppe Pellegrini<\/a> and Cristina Grasseni<\/a> convened or presented papers, as did regular visitors Simone Arnaldi<\/a> and Ren\u00e9 von Schomberg<\/a>. Socio-gerontechnology Network<\/a> members Alexander Peine and Helen Manchester participated, alongside Critical Infrastructures Lab<\/a> co-founder Maxigas.<\/p>\n

Contributors included several other well-known figures from within the Responsible Innovation community whose work has been reviewed on this website, including Lotte Asveld<\/a>, Michael Bernstein<\/a>, Tess Doezema<\/a>, Rider Foley<\/a>, Christopher Groves<\/a>, Eleanor Hadley Kershaw<\/a> and Michiel Van Oudheusden<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The close relationship between STS and responsible innovation was easy to see at this conference.<\/p>\n

I saw and heard some fascinating interventions during my time at the conference across a broad range of topics and methodologies, including a full-day panel<\/a> about the practices of artists, designers, and artistic researchers whose aim is to inspire STS to rethink the position of the arts, including using arts-based interventions as catalysts for strengthening human nature connectedness. This was an impressively broad offering.<\/p>\n\n\t\t