The Turn to Technology in Social Studies of Science

TLDR

Critiques of technological determinism and empirical studies reveal analytic ambivalences in the social study of technology. The article examines how applying relativist‑constructivism to technology affects the theoretical significance of the sociology of scientific knowledge. The authors critically examine the injunction to consider technology as text. The article demonstrates that ignoring analytic ambivalences in SSK undermines its strategic significance, that treating SSK merely as an explanatory formula limits its epistemic reconceptualization, and that a reflexive reading of the “technology as text” slogan is required to restore some of its epistemological value.

Abstract

This article examines how the special theoretical significance of the sociology of scientific knowledge (SSK) is affected by attempts to apply relativist-constructivism to technology. The article shows that the failure to confront key analytic ambivalences in the practice of SSK has compromised its original strategic significance. In particular, the construal of SSK as an explanatory formula diminishes its potential for profoundly reconceptualizing epistemic issues. A consideration of critiques of technological determinism, and of some empirical studies, reveals similar analytic ambivalences in the social study of technology (SST). The injunction to consider "technology as text" is critically examined. It is concluded that a reflexive interpretation of this slogan is necessary to recover some of the epistemological significance lost in the constructivist move from SSK to SST.