«  Une bombe dans la discipline  » : l’émergence du mouvement génopolitique en science politique

Abstract

Mobilizing scientometric analyses and semi-structured interviews, this article investigates the emergence of ‘genopolitics’ and the scientific and academic stakes surrounding the study of genetic factors of political behavior. While the first paper on genopolitics was published in 2005, it was not until 2012 that we could observe the stabilization of this scientific movement. Though genopolitics is a relatively homogenous movement, it is nonetheless affected by internal struggles relating to the construction of a scientific programme that would be regarded as legitimate by all of its members, as well as by political scientists and the rest of the scientific field as a whole. Beyond these disagreements concerning the best appellation for, and main goal of, their programme, genopoliticians advocate for the emergence of a new paradigm in political science that would resolve the anomalies observed within empirical research resorting to the dominant rational choice and socio-psychological theories. Paradoxically, one consequence of this attempt at advancing political science is to threaten its epistemological independence, as illustrated by the use of methodological standards borrowed from behavior genetics. At the individual level, genopolitics provides an opportunity for political scientists to contribute to a controversial, but innovative area of research, and thus to ameliorate their position within the scientific field.