Seeing Technology Assessment with New Eyes

In: Klüver/Nielsen/Jørgensen (Eds.), 2015, Policy-Oriented Technology Assessment Across Europe. Expanding Capacities; London: Palgrave Pivot; 18-36.Van Est et al. present a 'relational' model for analysing technology assessment (TA) institutions. Expanding on metaphor of TA as a bridge between science, society and policy, the authors describe how such bridges are established in terms of network relations. European TA institutions in various ways link parliaments and governments with civil society and science. In part, TA projects provide such linkages, but importantly, TA institutions in themselves also provide informal personal links between societal spheres. With in-depth examples from diffrent European member states, Van Est et al. provide institutional entrepreneurs with rich material for imagining institutional TA arrangements that might fi within their own national arenas