During large parts of its history chemistry was seen as a science of progress, admired by many. But contemporary public debates on chemistry have been quite critical, mainly for environmental reasons. Therefore is it interesting to note that in the course of the 1990s “green chemistry” emerged. The origins, scientific meaning and drivers behind the spectacular growth of that new field are the subject of Research between Science, Society and Politics: The History and Scientific Development of Green Chemistry. The scientific (...) character of green chemistry has been a matter of dispute since its inception. This book aims to clarify that dispute. It presents a historical analysis of its birth and evolution, with a special focus on the USA, the UK and the Netherlands and the chemical societies in these countries. The emergence of green chemistry differed from one country to another, which is analyzed and compared as well. Based on quantitative and qualitive research methods and a wide range of primary sources never studied before, this book ultimately offers a new characterization of “green chemistry”. It should be of interest to chemists, policy makers and historians & philosophers of chemistry, because Research between Science, Society and Politics accounts for both internal scientific as well as socio-cultural factors that played a role during the emergence and growth of green chemistry. (shrink)

This paper aims to explore disciplinary variation in valuation practices by comparing the way research groups accumulate credibility across four epistemic cultures. Our analysis is based on case studies of four high-performing research groups representing very different epistemic cultures in humanities, social sciences, geosciences and mathematics. In each case we interviewed about ten researchers, analyzed relevant documents and observed a couple of meetings. In all four cases we found a cyclical process of accumulating credibility. At the same time, we found (...) significant differences in the manifestation of the six main resources that are part of the cycle, the mechanisms of conversion between these resources, the overall structure and the average speed of the credibility cycle. The different ways in which the groups use data and produce arguments affect the whole cycle of accumulating credibility. In some cultures, journal publications are the main source of recognition, but in others one can earn significant amounts of recognition for conference contributions or service to the academic community. Moreover, the collaboration practices in the respective fields strongly influence the connection between arguments and publications. In cultures where teams of researchers collaboratively produce arguments, it is more strongly embedded in the process of writing publications. We conclude that the credibility cycle can only be used as an analytical tool to explain the behavior of researchers or research groups when taking differences across epistemic cultures into account. (shrink)

Many science systems are witnessing the rise of intermediary organizations with a coordinating mission, but to date a systematic understanding of their function and effects is lacking. The aim of this paper is to contribute to the understanding of the coordinating efforts of intermediary organizations. Starting from the definition of coordination as the establishment or strengthening of a relationship among the activities in a system, with the aim to enhance their common effectiveness, I develop a heuristic framework that facilitates the (...) systematic analysis of coordination in science. I illustrate and substantiate my framework with the empirical case study of a Dutch coordination task force in the area of chemical technologies. Thanks to the framework I could disentangle a number of functions that this task force fulfils concerning research programming, funding allocation and supporting interactions and collaborations. This approach enabled me to systematically analyse a very heterogeneous set of processes that each deserve to be called coordination. The analysis yields a clear overview of eight coordination processes that are each described in terms of activities, intervention, relationships, mechanisms and performance. I conclude my paper with suggestions for further research on coordination in the science system. (shrink)