This project is a collaborative, multi-sited ethnographic study that will examine how the rhetoric used by scientists serves to influence scientific contributions to policy.
Intellectual Merit
The researchers will examine how scientists engage and argue with one another about policy. Specifically, they will collect and analyze the rhetoric used by scientists who are engaged in the development of two types of low carbon energy technologies, wind power and nuclear power, in order to understand how the composition of their reasoning influences energy policy, and how their rhetoric could serve as a productive starting point for integrating scientific knowledge into policy decisions.
Broader Impacts
The project has societal relevance in terms of training a diverse set of students in social science methodologies and of making the participating scientists aware of the results so as to improve the integration of science in policymaking with respect to the crucial issues of climate change mitigation and energy security.
