The "Racial" Economy of Science: Toward a Democratic Future

Preface

PREFACE This collection brings together both classic and recent essays on the natural sciences by historians, anthropologists, linguists, biologists, engineers, policy analysts , sociologists, and community activists as well as statements by such institutions as the National Academy of Sciences, the Penang Conference on Science and Technology, and The Black Scholar. It is intended to show the richness and diversity of critical reflections on how Western sciences have been located in world history, to draw attention to the achievements and resources of scientific traditions in other cultures, and to stimulate thought about how to link scientific work more closely to democracy-advancing projects. All of these essays challenge the assumption that Western sciences have been entirely progressive forces in history as well as the assumption that it is individuals alone, or even primarily, who are responsible for the socially progressive or regressive consequences of science. Instead, all of the authors try to locate the broader social projects of Western cultures that have appropriated the resources of the sciences and to identify the features of Western sciences that have made them particularly attractive and susceptible to appropriation for racist and imperialist agendas. Of course, many of the authors are themselves scientists or engineers; this collection is not "against scientists," who for the most part-like the rest of ustry to do the best they can in a world of confusing choices and of choices that appear much more limited than they should be. Nor are these authors engaged in "science bashing" or in "bashing" Western sciences. All of them value scientific knowledge and the resources it can provide when harnessed to projects of making and remaking democracy. They see sciences as containing both regressive and progressive tendencies and their task as to block the regressive and support the progressive. Moreover, readers will see author after author pointing out how better understandings of nature result when scientific projects are linked with and incorporate projects of advancing democracy; politically regressive societies are likely to produce partial and distorted accounts of the natural and social world. If these authors are right, then their essays make a contribution not only to the social studies of science but also to the natural sciences themselves: those who ignore the past are doomed to repeat it. There are tensions and contradictions between the claims in these essays and between their images of science. Each author is writing from the perspective of some particular set of interactions with the sciences-their own or, often, other people's. They are analyzing the interactions with the sciences of would-be and actual scientists, of the victims of environmental disasters, or of the beneficiaries and victims of scientific descriptions of the races; they are reflecting on the x / Preface changing goals institutions, practices, and personnel of the sciences in history and cross culturally. They are trying to figure out how to change one science or several. They are writing at different times in recent decades and at different stages in social studies of science scholarship. Different traditions of political philosophy shape their perceptions. Their perspectives on the sciences are diverse . Echoes .of virtually every recent dispute about how to conceptualize race, racism, imperialism, colonialism, science, technology, the social studies, and philosophy of science and technology, and the relations between all or any of them can be found in these essays. These essays have been selected in part because the diversity and the tensions they exhibit raise new and provocative questions about the sciences and societies we have and those we could have. In spite of the seriousness of the topics and the often horrendous practices and consequences of Western sciences and technologies reported by these authors, readers will find the collection energizing and even fun to read. The authors are excellent at drawing readers into their analyses. Many are superb stylists. Many are among the most distinguished and most widely known thinkers in their field. All of the essays are immediately accessible to a general audience. There are two kinds of editorial introductions to the essays. The general introduction , Eurocentric Scientific Illiteracy-A Challenge for the World Community ," sets the collection in the context of diverse current interests in the topic, provides an overview of the concerns of its six sections, and briefly previews several central themes in these writings to enable readers to follow the arguments in a more critical and informed way. There is also a brief introduction to each section that sets the section's essays in context and identifies...