This paper draws general insights into the public reception of scientific knowledge from a case study of Cumbrian sheep farmers' responses to scientific advice about the restrictions introduced after the Chernobyl radioactive fallout. The analysis identifies several substantive factors which influence the credibility of scientific communication. Starting from the now-accepted point that public uptake of science depends primarily upon the trust and credibility public groups are prepared to invest in scientific institutions and representatives, the paper observes that these are contingent upon the social relationships and identities which people feel to be affected by scientific knowledge, which never comes free of social interests or implications. The case study shows laypeople capable of extensive informal reflection upon their social relationships towards scientific experts, and on the epistemological status of their own `local' knowledge in relation to `outside' knowledge. Public uptake of science might be improved if scientific institutions expressed an equivalent reflexive discourse in the public domain.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
1.
Wynne, B. , 1980, Technology, risk and participation: on the social treatment of uncertainty. Society, Technology and Risk, edited by J. Conrad (London, New York: Academic Press), pp. 167-202.
2.
The Royal Society of London , 1985, The Public Understanding of Science (London: Royal Society).
3.
Wynne, B. , 1991, Knowledges in context. Science, Technology and Human Values, 16, 111-121.
4.
Wynne, B. , 1992, Public understanding of science research: new horizons or hall of mirrors?Public Understanding of Science, 1, 37-43.
5.
Douglas, M. , 1986, Risk Acceptability According to the Social Sciences (New York: Russell Sage Foundation).
6.
Several main sociological perspectives are represented in Krimsky, S., and Golding, D., 1992, Social Theories of Risk (New York: Praeger).
7.
Reprinted in Bradby, H., 1991, Dirty Words: Writings on the History and Culture of Pollution (London: Earthscan) pp. 139-160.
8.
Slovic, P. , 1992, Perceptions of risk: reflections on the psychometric paradigm. Social Theories of Risk, edited by S. Krimsky and D. Golding (New York: Praeger).
9.
Gambetta, D. , 1988, Trust: Making and Breaking Cooperative Relations (Oxford: Blackwell).
10.
Unger, R. M. , 1976, Law in Modern Society (New York: Free Press).
11.
For a critique in the context of risk perception research, see Wynne, B., 1989, Building public concerns into risk management. Environmental Threats, edited by J. Brown (London: Belhaven), pp. 118-132.
12.
Latour, B. , and Woolgar, S., 1979, Laboratory Life: The Social Construction of Scientific Facts (London, Beverley Hills: Sage).
13.
Livens, F. R. , and Loveland, P. J., 1988, The influence of soil properties on the environmental mobility of caesium in Cumbria. Soil Use and Management, 4(3), 69-75.
14.
and McSorley, J., 1990, Living in the Shadow: the Story of the People of Sellafield (London, Sydney: Pan Books).
15.
See Arnold, L., 1992, Windscale 1957: the Anatomy of a Nuclear Accident (London, New York: Macmillan).
16.
Wynne, B. , 1982, Rationality and Ritual: the Windscale Inquiry and Nuclear Decisions in Britain (Chalfont St Giles: British Society for the History of Science).
17.
see also Wynne, B., 1991, Public understanding and the management of science. The Management of Science, edited by D. Hague (London, New York: Macmillan).
18.
Beresford, N. A. , et al., 1989, The effect of treating pastures with bentonite on the transfer of 137Cs from grazed herbage to sheep. Journal of Environmental Radioactivity, 9, 112-122. This paper recognizes the loss of body weight suffered by the sheep in these tests, though it suggests this may be due to the direct effects of the bentonite, and ignores the possible effect of their being fenced in.
19.
and House of Commons Agriculture Select Committee, 1988, Chernobyl: the Government's Response (London: HMSO).
20.
These were produced by the Institute for Terrestrial Ecology at Merlewood in South Cumbria. The map was first published in The Guardian newspaper, 25 July 1986, after pressure on the then Director of the Merlewood laboratory not to publish. See also House of Commons Agriculture Select Committee, 1988, Chernobyl: the Government's Response (London: HMSO). The Merlewood scientists rapidly gained a reputation amongst the farmers for being more open about uncertainties and better at listening to farmers' knowledge than government and industry scientists.
21.
A more complete paper was published in 1988, which contained the map as shown in Figure 3: Clark, M. J., and Smith, F. B., 1988, Wet and dry deposition of Chernobyl releases. Nature, 332, 245-249.
22.
The quotes are from transcripts of interviews, which were taped and then transcribed in abridged form to record elements of relevance to this study. Over 50 interviews were conducted with affected farmers, farmers' wives, MAFF officials, scientists, farmers' representatives, and others. Each interview lasted between one and two hours; several repeat visits were made, allowing some observation of changing beliefs. The interviews were mostly conducted by Peter and Jean Williams, accompanied by the author on about 12 occasions. Public meetings and markets were also attended and observed. All the quotes in the text are verbatim quotes from interview tapes.
23.
See also Chernobyl I and II, Farmers Weekly (London), 4 and 11 March 1988.
24.
On the social construction of `black boxes' as if naturally determined, see Latour, B., 1986, Science in Action (London: Open University Press).
25.
This account is taken from the author's field notes from attendance at the meeting, in Broughton-in-Furness, Cumbria, February 1987.
26.
House of Commons Agriculture Select Committee , 1988, Chernobyl: the Government's Response (London: HMSO).
27.
On hidden ambivalence and alienation, see Wynne, B., 1987, Risk perception, decision analysis and the public acceptance problem. Risk Management and Hazardous Wastes: Implementation and the Dialectics of Credibility (London, Berlin, New York: Springer), Chap. 11.
28.
See also Knorr-Cetina, K., 1989, Epistemic cultures: forms of reason in science. History of Political Economy, 23, 105-122.
29.
Starr, S. L. , and Griesemer, J., 1989, Institutional ecology; translations and boundary objects: amateurs and professionals in Berkeley's Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, 1907-1939. Social Studies of Science, 19(3), 387-420.
30.
Also Jupp, A., 1989, The provision of public information and major industrial accident hazards. Unpublished MSc thesis, Manchester University.
31.
Callon, M. , 1986, Some elements of a sociology of translation: domestication of the scallops and the fishermen of St Brieuc Bay. Power, Action and Belief, edited by J. Law, Sociological Reviews Monographs, No. 32 (Keele University Press), pp. 196-233.
32.
Shotter, J. , and Gergin, K., 1988, Texts of Identity (London: Sage).
33.
This capability could be equated with the informal resistance of people in solidary sub-cultures to meanings, identities or rationalities imposed on them from `outside', as in Bailey, F. G., 1968, A peasant view of the bad life. Peasants and Peasant Society, edited by T. Shanin (Harmondsworth: Penguin Books).
34.
For suggestive correspondence with feminist critiques of science, see Harding, S., 1986, The Science Question in Feminism (Milton Keynes: Open University Press). On the significance of ambivalence I have been helped by Leigh Starr and Vicki Singleton, though they should not be implicated in my particular rendering of it here.
