Knowledge and Governance

The Section ‘Knowledge and Governance’ provides the long-standing forum for a growing and diverse body of research on the relationship between knowledge, policy and politics. The section invites panels and papers interested in issues such as the role of scientific evidence in policy-making; the political uses of knowledge; the social construction of expertise; the formation and functioning of epistemic communities; the democratization of expertise and the ‘participatory turn’ in knowledge production; the effects of polarization and partisan politics on knowledge use and the emergence of post-truth politics. A special focus this year will be the on changing politics of expertise in the context of normative theories of democracy. The governance of social and economic problems increasingly relies on the continuous production and use of scientific evidence and research. This trend has been especially prevalent in areas of policy characterised by risk and uncertainty where science and expertise are often vital to political and bureaucratic decision-making. Yet both the production of scientific expertise and its uses in the political context have raised important empirical and theoretical questions. The section invites 1-2 panels in this area of empirical and theoretical research. A particular focus in research on knowledge and governance has been the organization and institutionalization of the nexus between science and politics, its variation across political and geographical space, and its reconfiguration over time. This research observes organizational boundaries as well as the structures and interactions of knowledge networks and epistemic communities in the national, transnational and global context, often by focusing on international or European institutions. The section invites 1-2 panels in this area of empirical and theoretical research. Recently, the emergence of post-truth politics has forced political science to confront questions of knowledge and politics with new urgency. This sections continues to provide a home for the ongoing academic debate of these developments and their empirical and theoretical implications for politics and political research. Especially the current global pandemic has provided a vivid backdrop against which to reassess the varying dynamics of post-truth politics in different political contexts, as well as the emergence of both radicalization and counter mobilization along a new social, cultural and political cleavage in modern politics. The section invites 1-2 panels in this broad field of empirical and theoretical research. The dependence of politics on scientific and expert knowledge has long raised thorny issues of democratic legitimacy. Especially in the context of existential threats to society such as global health emergencies or the climate crisis, established normative standards of participation and representation in democratic decision making as well as more demanding models of deliberative democracy have come under renewed scrutiny. This section panel invites 1 panel to highlight current empirical and normative debates in this area of political research.