How Science Can Help Shape Socio-economic Transformations
12.05.2021
Societal transformations are often driven by the findings of science. The edited volume "Wissenschaft im Strukturwandel" shows how the interactions between science and society are changing research practice.
Scientists are expected to provide knowledge, propose solutions and communicate them to both politicians and the public in a way that is easily understood. The socio-economic transformations unfolding in the former mining regions of the Rhineland, Ruhr, and Lusatia are a case in point.
The book "Wissenschaft im Strukturwandel" (Science in Structural Change) by IASS researchers Jeremias Herberg and Johannes Staemmler and former IASS Scientific Director Patrizia Nanz presents 14 articles that show how – done right – science can foster democratic culture to resolve conflicts around transformations by guiding and facilitating the search for solutions in policy and practice and questioning powerful assumptions. For the scientists on the ground, achieving this requires that they reinvent their role and expand their toolbox of methods.
The book offers an overview of a transformative research landscape that defines itself through its social impacts and dedicated practice. The authors examine socio-ecological transformations as change processes whose wide-ranging effects extend to science itself.
To celebrate the book’s release, editors Jeremias Herberg, Johannes Staemmler, and Patrizia Nanz invite interested scholars and members of the public to an online book launch at 3.00 p.m. on 28 May 2021. Please register here. A confirmation email including access details for the event will be sent following registration.
Reviews:
"This book will fuel the debate on harnessing science more effectively for society. It is absolutely worth reading!"
- Uwe Schneidewind, Mayor of Wuppertal
“If everything must change, then science cannot remain as it is. This book provides a compass.“
- Claus Leggewie, Political scientist
"If political actors are going to cherry-pick research findings, then researchers must be cognisant of their role in politics. This makes questions of justice and reason all the more pressing. The authors of this volume cast a bold spotlight on these issues."
- Claus Offe, Political scientist
- Jeremias Herberg, Johannes Staemmler, and Patrizia Nanz (eds.), Wissenschaft im Strukturwandel. Die paradoxe Praxis engagierter Transformationsforschung, oekom Verlag 2021, https://doi.org/10.14512/9783962388256
