Short abstract:

Organizations are often seen to lose relevance in the course of digital transformation. I contrast these expectations with the empirical observation that—although social coordination is undergoing differentiation—organizations are by no means losing their role as anchor points of transformation.

Long abstract:

According to recurring expectations in social science discourse, formal organizations (e.g., companies, foundations, NGOs, state administrations) are anticipated to lose socio-economic relevance in the course of digital transformation and to increasingly fade into the background compared to other modes of social coordination (e.g., technically-mediated communities and networks).

In my presentation, I would like to contrast these expectations with the empirical observation that—although social coordination is undergoing further automation and differentiation as a result of digitization—formal organizations are by no means losing their role as anchor points of social order or as agents of transformation.

This applies to the dominant digital platforms and ecosystems as everyday coordination and communication structures of contemporary society, whose development is primarily determined by the corporate actors behind them, the activities of civil society organizations, and state regulatory bodies.

And this also applies to innovation- and transformation-oriented niche initiatives (e.g., open source, open science, or commons projects), which, from a certain degree of growth and societal relevance, cannot do without the formation of formal organizational structures or the association with umbrella organizations.

These examples particularly indicate that formal organizations are entering into a variety of new interrelationships with other modes of social coordination (e.g., networks, platforms, communities, forms of partial organization) in the course of digital transformation, which are successively changing their role in phases of socio-technological change, but by no means diminishing their position as agents and anchor points of societal transformation.

Short abstract:

Sociotechnical transformations (e.g., digitalization) are significantly influenced and propelled by future-oriented narratives on sociotechnical transformation. In this paper, I delve into the potential of integrating the analytical notion of organization into STS research on sociotechnical futures.

Long abstract:

In this paper, I delve into the potential of integrating the analytical notion of organization into research on sociotechnical futures (also Raible 2022, Meyer 2020).

Sociotechnical transformations (e.g., digitalization) are significantly influenced and propelled by future-oriented narratives on sociotechnical transformation. Scholars in STS have emphasized the pivotal role of sociotechnical imaginaries (Jasanoff, Kim 2009, 2013) and expectations in technological development (van Lente, Rip 1998) in shaping these transformations. The latter argues that these expectations are generated by promising narratives about the future that enable present practices (e.g., development, funding, or implementation of technology) and consequently possess transformative capabilities.

However, the importance of organizations in modern societies and their role in these processes are often analytically under-represented in such research.

To address this gap and take organizations seriously, I propose a structurational model (Giddens 1984) that synthesizes the STS concept of expectations in technological development (van Lente, Rip 1998) with insights from organizational sociology (Ortmann et al. 2023).

This proposed perspective enables the understandig of the interplay of future-oriented narratives and organizations.

As an illustration, I will discuss two cases from my own research representing various interplays of future-oriented narratives on digitalization and organizations: (1) organizational practices involving the development of existing narratives (e.g., Industry 4.0, Autonomous Driving) and the proposition of a new narrative about the future to other organizations; (2) reflexive re-structurations of organizations enabled and constrained by future-oriented narratives (e.g., Cloud technologies).

Short abstract:

How can inter-organizational dynamics be mobilized to study governmental networks? Drawing on research on the infrastructural management of populations, this presentation mobilizes organization studies to show how information infrastructures can influence the broader structural conditions of Europe.

Long abstract:

How can inter-organizational dynamics be mobilized to study and shape governmental networks? The re-ordering of national functions at the European scale constitutes one of the contemporary most contested but also visionary societal and institutional transformations. In this institutional re-ordering, states and Europe are understood as polities. And yet operational continuity among member states is often assured at the administrative, rather than political or policy levels. This is especially true of highly contested areas, such as the management of population in Area Freedom Justice and Security (AFJS), where political agreement might result impossible. Following the deployment and use of data infrastructures supporting operational agency in population management reveals a different assemblage than a unified political body with clear boundaries. It rather reveals conflicting, jeopardized and contingent networks of inter-organizational relations among bodies at local, national and supranational scale, and non-governmental actors, as well.

This evidence raises a series of question. Which concepts from organization studies can be mobilized to make sense of such de facto re-arrangements of digital sovereignty? What would their added value be with respect to traditional political theory and policy conceptualizations? Which new directions of research would conceiving of European agencies and states as inter-organizationally linked open up?

Drawing on a twelve-year-long research trajectory and on ERC-funded research on the infrastructural management of borders and populations on the move to Europe, this presentation mobilizes organization studies concepts to show how information infrastructures can influence the broader structural and organizational conditions of Europe in multiple ways.

Short abstract:

Digitalization opens new possibilities for public participation in science. Organizations are key for better understanding and critically reflecting such transformations. This will be explored for the case of Citizen Science.

Long abstract:

This paper examines how organizations matter for transformations in science-society relations with digitalization. It focuses on inclusion, i.e., how people are made relevant in communication. Approaches for public participation in science and technology aim at pushing the boundaries of who is regarded as part of science and what potential involvement can look like. Citizen Science is a recent iteration of such inclusion programs. It seeks to facilitate the active participation of more people in research with the help of digital technologies. This setting is typically examined with a critical ambition regarding the question of whether it affords bottom-up or top-down forms of participation.

My research aims to transgress this framing and open up new angles of critique by drawing on the notion of organization. It is at the meso-level of organizations, I argue, that macro-processes like establishing new inclusion (policy) programs and micro-processes like doing participatory research are brought – partially and tensely – together.

My talk will focus on the dimension of organizations as sites of social transformation. I will analyze Citizen Science as a template for a shift in the inclusion order of science from organizational membership to contributorship. I will discuss how this transformation is stabilized and how organizations are themselves transformed in the process. What potential implications does this entail for science-society relations? And where can we refocus critiques to render new aspects of this transformation up for debate?

Short abstract:

This paper contributes to the discussion on the role of science communication/and public engagement in scientific institutions and universities. We map communication practices and classify them into functions, and discuss how the organisation can be a means for public engagement in research.

Long abstract:

This paper offers a view on the emerging practice of managing external relations of the modern university, and the role of science communication in this. With a representative sample of research universities in four countries, we seek to broaden our understanding of the science communication (SC) function and its niche within the modern university. We distinguish science communication from corporate communication functions and examine how they distribute across organisational levels. We find that communication functions can be represented along a spectrum of (de)centralisation: public relations and marketing activities are more likely carried out at the central level (central offices), and public affairs and SC activities are more likely carried out at decentral levels (e.g. in specific offices and/or research institutes, departments). This study shows that little attention is paid to science communication at central structures, suggesting that it is not a practice that aligns easily with university corporate communication, yet SC might find its niche increasingly in decentral locations of activity.

Short abstract:

KIT focused on research for and with society in its excellence strategy. Real-world laboratories were established as places to implement transformative research. This contribution examines the question of the conditions under which research organisations can reach a transformative impact.

Long abstract:

Transformation research conceptualises change as the dynamic development of complex systems. The energy transition, the mobility transition and the digital transformation can be understood as such systems. Research should generate both orientation knowledge and assessment of potential consequences. To what extent can universities have a transformative effect? This question will be explored using the example of the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), the “research university in the Helmholtz Association”. As a university, KIT is bound by the Baden-Württemberg State Higher Education Act. It is also a member of the Helmholtz Association with it’s mission: "Our research should serve society and provide solutions to the central questions of our time".

This contribution critically reflects on the current state of transformative research at KIT and also sheds light on how KIT has changed as a research organisation. Involved early in scientific policy advice to the German Bundestag and the European Parliament, it gains impact in social change. Over time, the methodologically broad concept of technology assessment has become more participatory and currently, through research in real-world laboratories, more transformative. Research for and with society became a core issue of KIT excellence strategy. But how transformative can a tax-funded research organisation be? How actively can it participate in sustainable urban design, for example, and what about the necessary distance to ensure high quality research?

Short abstract:

This paper explores the dynamics between a national university as a specific organizational form and its production of activist-scientists to examine how these peculiar epistemic subjects establish and marshal expertise in both political and scientific arenas.

Long abstract:

In direct contrast to universalistic and disinterested constructions of knowledge, the rise of patriotic science (Fonseca et al., 2022; Rambukwella, 2023) points to the increasing accommodation of epistemic subjects whose work is likely to be locally situated and socio-politically inflected. These activist-scientists are peculiar for not conforming to the "traditional scientific cultural norms of impartiality and neutrality," are often tied to "crisis situations," and challenge traditional conceptions of expertise (Isopp, 2014). How these actors accumulate and deploy scientific credibility, however, remains an open question. This paper explores the dynamics between a national university and its accompanying organizations in the production of these actors. The study focuses on the case of AGHAM (the Filipino or Tagalog word for science) which is a professional and student organization with members and alumni based largely at the University of the Philippines Diliman. The organization’s activities in response to specific crises are examined through public statements, produced studies, interviews, and other organizational artifacts. Through these, dynamics between a national university as a specific organizational form and the activist organization are examined in how the former animates, legitimizes, and empowers the latter. Doing so hopes to shed light on this particular model of contemporary knowledge production in how such actors deal with the particular problem of establishing and marshalling expertise in both political and scientific arenas.

Short abstract:

Keywords: Scientific Third sector - Organisations - Citizen science - Invisibility - Power

Long abstract:

In the context of sustainable societal and environmental transitions, citizen science (CS) has a key role to play as it contributes to the democratization of innovation. Citizen science promotes intermediation between the scientific third sector (Ottolini, 2020, Lhoste and Sardin 2024) and academic organisations (Alliss 2017, Houllier and al. 2017). We postulate that 1/ such cooperation is a robust configuration for the production of actionable knowledge 2/ methods and skills tested in previous CS experiences justify an attempt to generalise some of them 3/ CS allows the endogenous development of the network.

In this communication we discuss the results of a multi-stakeholder research project called EQUIPACT. The aim of this project is to improve the quality and societal impact of CS. The consortium consists of eight NGO’s, two public laboratories, three public research institutes, one museum and one private laboratory. We introduce and discuss the notion of the scientific third sector in relation to commonly used notions of civil society and non-governmental organisations. This leads to an exploration of the common characteristics and trajectories of project member organisations and individuals involved in citizen science mediation to date. Our material consists of interviews (n=20), archivals and engagement observations.

Short abstract:

The COVID-19 pandemic exemplifies how organizations at the boundaries of science, politics, and the media who engage in science communication shape – and are shaped by – the role of science in society. What do empirical insights from two German case studies imply for STS and organization studies?

Long abstract:

Organizations take on central roles in science communication: Internationally, scientific academies (Lentsch 2010) as well as novel organizations in the realm of journalism (Suhr et al. 2022) are relevant communicators. A case in point is the COVID-19 pandemic where organizational science communication resonated broadly in the media as well as politics.

In Germany, the National Academy of Sciences Leopoldina (Beck and Nardmann 2021), as well as the Science Media Center (SMC) (Broer 2020), engaged in science communication during the COVID-19 pandemic by providing highly visible yet controversial scientific policy advice and media services.

Due to their positioning at the boundaries of science, politics, and the media, such organizations shape the social status of science (Rödder 2020): For example, they formalize the development of consensus among individual scientists in ad-hoc working groups to advise the government or they standardize processes of selecting scientific experts for media reports.

At the same time, such organizations are shaped by the role of science in society: For example, they need to deal with structurally conflicting expectations regarding science communication within politics and the media (Rödder 2020) or with challenging public attitudes towards science such as science-related populism (Mede and Schäfer 2020).

Through qualitative analyses of media coverage, documents, and expert interviews with journalists, scientists, as well as employees of the Leopoldina and the SMC Germany, we explore the role of organizations in communicating science in times of crisis. In our talk, we discuss empirical findings and their implications for STS and organization studies.

Short abstract:

Plant breeding organizations can contribute to more sustainable and just agri-food systems. However, enabling this transformative potential has proven difficult. Drawing on practice-based organizational theories we study how breeding decisions are made in the face of structural and social factors.

Long abstract:

Plant breeding organisations are said to have significant transformative potential for agri-food systems. However, breeding organisations are conditioned by diverse socio-technical factors that enable and constrain this potential. STS has largely investigated structural issues such as ownership and shifting regimes (Parthasarathy, 2011; Legun, 2022). However, little research has considered breeding decisions from 'inside' the organisation (Glover, 2010; McGuire, 2008).

Building on the STS tradition of laboratory studies and theories on organizational learning (Orlikowski, 2002; Nicolini 2010), we studied how the transformative potential of plant breeding is enabled and constrained inside breeding organisations. We draw on two months of ethnographic fieldwork of an Irish potato breeding program where we engaged with breeders, field and lab technicians, and commercial staff.

For one, we found that decision-making operates in a space of fundamental uncertainty about how varieties will perform in distant growing conditions and value chains. Consequently the breeding program does not execute a clearly defined plan but rather continuously adapts as breeding lines are characterized and market contexts change.

Second, we found that even inside breeding programs there are contesting perspectives on what improvement is. Different types of improvements are valued by people with different types of expertise (such as crop breeders, field technicians, and marketeers) and by different organizational parts (such as R&D, marketing, etc.).

These features of organizational learning found inside breeding programs complement existing STS scholarship on ownership and shifting regimes, thus contributing to our understanding of under what conditions plant breeding organisations can contribute to transform agri-food systems.