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Workshop: Technopolitics and the Politics of STS Research: Experiences from Germany and Turkey
Workshop | Oktober 7, 2022 | 10.00-17.00 | TU Berlin
Organiser: Aybike Alkan, History of Technology, TU Berlin
Workshop Theme:
The interest in Science and Technology Studies (STS) has been increasing in Germany and Turkey in recent years. Accordingly, STS communities have crafted innovative platforms for producing and exchanging knowledge beyond university settings, such as stsing in Germany and Istanbulab in Turkey. This workshop will bring together 8 to 10 researchers from these initiatives around the specific concept of technopolitics as it refers to “a strategic practice of designing or using technology to constitute, embody, or enact political goals” (Hecht, 2009, p. 15). The workshop’s aims are twofold: to examine different perspectives on technopolitics and to facilitate exchanges between European and non-European approaches to STS. Initiating communication between researchers from Germany’s and Turkey’s STS environments, the workshop also invites the researchers to discuss the ways of expanding these exchanges into the future.
In terms of the level of technological development, Germany and Turkey have fallen under different categories, which for a long time have been described as “developed” and “developing.” This difference also entailed asymmetric power relations, especially regarding the processes of technology transfer, which reflects and registers differences in the politics of technological change. As an initial observation, technopolitics in Turkey has been more about the adaptation of imported technologies whereas, in Germany, it is also about first-hand design and R&D activities. While these differences are at the core of STS analysis that pays close attention to (trans)national context, they also shape the research agenda and practices of STS scholars and, thereby, the politics of STS research. For instance, STS in Turkey has emerged as a reflexive and critical endeavor about technoscientific developments and adapting them by being attuned to the sensibilities and realities of the country. The workshop will provide a space to foster these initial arguments about experiences on technopolitical changes and accompanying research practices in Germany and Turkey.