Abstract
Alongside the gradual increase in use of participatory technology assessment (PTA), a tool to democratize decision-making on controversial technologies, a growing body of literature on how to assess the impact of PTA has developed. A distinction can be made between two generations of impact assessment studies. The first generation includes evaluations of the effects of PTAs on the state as a bounded unit of political decision-making. The second generation of assessment studies acknowledges a wider range of loci to study impact. However, neither provides insights into how a PTA impacts the relationships between the multiple arenas of political influence and political judgment. This paper develops a framework for impact assessment from a dynamic, process-oriented perspective. It draws on the 'dynamics of contention' theory proposed by McAdam et al. in Dynamics of Contention (Cambridge University Press, 2001). The framework is applied to three cases of PTA on controversial medical technologies: xenotransplantation (in the Netherlands and Switzerland) and genetic testing (in Austria).
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 599-608 |
| Number of pages | 10 |
| Journal | Science and Public Policy |
| Volume | 38 |
| Issue number | 8 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 1 Oct 2011 |
| Externally published | Yes |
Funding
This paper is part of a special issue which reports on work carried out as part of the project ‘Impact of Citizen Participation on Decision-Making in a Knowledge Intensive Policy Field’ (CIT-PART, Project No. SSH-225327), which is funded within the 7th Framework Programme from 2009–2012. For more information see the project website: <www.cit-part.at>.The authors would like to thank the European Commission for their support of this research, as well as the project participants for sharing insights into the topics discussed here. Two anonymous reviewers and the special issue’s guest editors provided helpful comments that contributed to the development of this paper. countries. Designed after the Danish consensus conference model, the PubliForum involved 28 citizens, selected to represent the Swiss population. To ensure a connection with the formal policy process, TA Swiss organized this event together with the Ministry and the Swiss National Science Foundation.