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Paper short abstract:

Stakeholder engagement is one of the fundamental dimensions of RRI. This presentation aims to explore the benefits and pitfalls (and local strategies of resistance and adaptation) of implementing participation and consultation tools in different countries within international projects.

Paper long abstract:

The "dialogical" or "participatory turn" in science precedes the emergence of the RRI concept. As the "deficit model" in science communication fell out of favour, a constellation of new practices of engaging the public in scientific discussions started to arise: consensus conferences, citizen jury, stakeholder consultations, to name just a few. A veritable industry of participatory methods has developed.

The inclusion of stakeholder engagement in the concept of RRI as defined by the European Commission is fundamentally a political recognition of the trend started in the STS field that promises to solve the long standing problem of the social acceptance of science and technology. It has become quasi-mandatory for project proposals to include at some point the participation of citizens. Conversely, whole projects have been almost solely devoted to citizen engagement in different S&T issues.

Consultation exercises that span different countries, sometimes even simultaneously, are increasingly common. One of the leading examples is the World Wide Views methodology. These procedures allow varying degrees of freedom to national teams, but the aim of data comparison often restricts this flexibility. Therefore, it begs to ask how these "imported" models of participation actually work in different local settings.

This presentation aims to explore the benefits and pitfalls of implementing participation and consultation tools developed in a different context, as well as the resistance and adaptation strategies that emerge. It is based on direct observation of consultation exercises and interviews with coordinators and team members of international projects in Portugal.