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Paper short abstract:

This paper examines the material process that allow both experts and non-experts to represent and objectify invisible risks in situations of uncertainty. The analysis aims to question the frequently postulated internal coherence and uniqueness of lay and expert ways of knowing.

Paper long abstract:

In this paper I analyze the patchwork practices through which local activists select and rearrange heterogeneous and contradictory information (expert discourses, sensorial experiences, and environmental knowledge) to build coherent technopolitical arguments against the risk of radioactive contamination around nuclear installations. The case study focuses on sociotechnical controversies around the presence of US Navy base for nuclear submarines installed on the Archipelago of La Maddalena, Sardinia (Italy) between 1972 and 2008. While Italian experts' assessments have routinely excluded the presence of radioactive contamination in the surrounding environment, unprecedented events, such as unexpected rates of birth defects, have introduced elements of uncertainty about the status and efficacy of expert knowledge.

Instead of assuming pre-existing and incommensurable ways of knowing separating experts and non-experts, I ask: what are the processes that allow actors involved in sociotechnical controversies to make invisible risks like radiation visible? Using the concept of "abduction" theorized by pragmatist philosopher Charles Peirce, I examine how both local communities and scientists understand the consequences of radioactive contamination by interpreting changes in the environment and unprecedented events, for which neither experts nor local residents have plausible explanations. My second contribution is to study risk historically by showing how its meanings in specific cultural and environmental contexts change over time as news signs become available for interpretation. This theoretical and methodological approach aims to destabilize the often taken for granted categories of experts and non-experts, and the frequently postulated internal coherence and uniqueness of lay and expert ways of knowing.