Department of Values, Technology and Innovation, Faculty of Technology, Policy and Management, Delft University of Technology, Jaffalaan 5, 2628 BX, Delft, The Netherlands.
Department of Industrial Engineering and Innovation Sciences, Section for Human-Technology-Interaction, Eindhoven University of Technology, Eindhoven, The Netherlands.
Sci Eng Ethics. 2020 Aug;26(4):2215-2234. doi: 10.1007/s11948-020-00199-0. Epub 2020 Feb 17.
This paper makes a conceptual inquiry into the notion of 'publics', and forwards an understanding of this notion that allows more responsible forms of decision-making with regards to technologies that have localized impacts, such as wind parks, hydrogen stations or flood barriers. The outcome of this inquiry is that the acceptability of a decision is to be assessed by a plurality of 'publics', including that of a local community. Even though a plurality of 'publics' might create competing normative demands, its acknowledgment is necessary to withstand the monopolization of the process of technology appraisal. The paper presents four ways in which such an appropriation of publicness takes place. The creation of dedicated 'local publics', in contrast, helps to overcome these problems and allows for more responsible forms of decision-making. We describe 'local publics' as those in which stakeholders from the different publics that are related to the process of technology implementation are brought together, and in which concerns and issues from these publics are deliberated upon. The paper will present eight conditions for increasing the effectiveness of such 'local publics'.
本文对“公众”这一概念进行了概念性探讨，并提出了一种理解该概念的方法，这种方法可以使我们更负责任地做出决策，以应对那些具有本地化影响的技术，如风力发电场、氢气站或防洪堤。这一探究的结果是，决策的可接受性应由多个“公众”来评估，包括当地社区的意见。尽管多个“公众”可能会产生相互竞争的规范要求，但承认这一点对于抵御技术评估过程的垄断是必要的。本文提出了公众意见被采纳的四种方式。相比之下，创造专门的“本地公众”有助于克服这些问题，并使决策更具责任感。我们将“本地公众”描述为那些将与技术实施过程相关的不同公众的利益相关者聚集在一起的公众，以及在这些公众中审议他们的关切和问题的公众。本文将提出增加此类“本地公众”效力的八项条件。
