What Is Public Engagement, and What Is It for? A Study of Scientists’ and Science Communicators’ Views
Abstract
The “Open Air Laboratories” (OPAL) is a large, England-wide environmental public engagement (PE) project based on the “citizen science” model. It is designed to involve people of all backgrounds and abilities in the production of environmental science and in the process to educate and raise awareness and enthusiasm about nature and its importance. This article draws on a series of interviews with scientists and science communicators involved in the project to explore their motivations and aims for the project and what they see as the goals of public engagement generally. We find a varied and nuanced array of motivations and aims that interviewees cite for taking part in the project, pointing toward a reevaluation of traditional ways of understanding the value of public engagement, policy relevance, and dialogue within public engagement. Especially relevant in relation to thinking about the policy relevance of PE is our conclusion that there are many different ways of thinking about the value of PE, characterized in this article as “the neglected middle.”
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Biographies
Hauke Riesch is a lecturer at the Department of Social Sciences, Media and Communications at Brunel University London. His research interests are the public understanding of science, especially risk and the environment, science blogging, popular science and the sociology and philosophy of science.
Clive Potter is a professor in Environmental Policy at Imperial College London. His research interests include issues around stakeholder and public engagement in public policy decisions relating to rural land use and biosecurity.
Linda Davies joined in Imperial College London in 1999 from a background in environmental policy. Her doctoral thesis and research are focused on biological monitoring and urban ecology. She has worked on a number of ecological projects including the UK National Ecosystem Assessment. She proposed the concept for the Open Air Laboratories (OPAL) programme in 2005 and led the partnership that delivered it from 2007 to 2013. She is a founder member and Director of the European Citizen Science Association.
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Article first published online: February 2, 2017
Issue published: October 2016
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