Technology Assessment for Participation: Experiences and Lessons

Abstract

In the United States, technology assessment (TA) originated from misgivings about technological determinism and technocracy. Ironi cally, this early "watchdog" type of TA aimed for objective knowledge about the social implications of technology In that paradoxical respect, TA itself was a technocratic concept. Particularly in Europe, TA was revamped as a "tracker dog," used to spot promising opportunities to bridge the gap between the economic-technical and the socioinstitu tional spheres of life. In this new concept, TA was to produce usable knowledge for public and private policy-making elites. In this intro ductory article, the argument is taken one step further. On practical as well as epistemological and methodological grounds, the article advo cates the development of a full-fledged interactive approach to TA. This is a concept of TA that seriously involves proximate and indirect stakeholders, and the public at large.

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