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Short abstract

We analyse the fishbowl discussion as a methodology that both studies and performs the organisation of interdisciplinary collaboration, reflecting on how such participatory formats can support the co-creation of collective futures and contribute to collaboratively defined STS research programmes.

Long abstract

Academic knowledge production is shaped by, and often reproduces, socio-economic and institutional hierarchies. Intellectual agendas tend to be guided by established figures, making it difficult for junior scholars and adjacent communities to fully participate. This dynamic favours continuity over experimentation and is widely recognised as a challenge in contemporary research culture (Lundberg et al., 2025; Pardo-Guerra, 2022; Sørensen, 2023). In this context, how can an STS community collectively define a future research agenda while remaining attentive to the very dynamics of participation, hierarchy, and knowledge production that STS itself studies?

This paper reflects on an experimental workshop organised by the Science and Technology Studies Cambridge Network (SCaN) that used a fishbowl discussion format to co-produce a shared research agenda. The fishbowl — a rotating conversation structure in which participants can move between listening and speaking positions — was deployed not only as a facilitation technique but also as a reflexive device for observing how voice, authority, and collaboration are organised within interdisciplinary academic communities.

Participants were invited to address two guiding questions: what does Science, Technology and Society look like in a science-led city such as Cambridge, and what might a shared STS research programme in this context entail? The dynamic circulation of participants redistributed conversational authority and enabled unexpected interventions from researchers, practitioners, and STS-adjacent actors. In practice, these interactions reshaped the planned structure of the workshop itself, prompting organisers to adapt the facilitation and reconsider how collective outputs should emerge.