Dear gregbo,
A great idea. The Loka Institute (loka.org) has embarked on a program
that empowers citizens to answer important questions like this. Here's a
clip or three from their site:
Making Science and Technology Responsive to Democratically Decided
Social and Environmental Concerns
The Loka Institute is a non-profit research and advocacy organization
concerned with the social, political, and environmental repercussions of
science and technology.
Their most recent work is: COMMUNITY-BASED RESEARCH IN THE UNITED STATES
- An Introductory Reconnaissance, Including Twelve Organizational Case
Studies and Comparison with the Dutch Science Shops and the Mainstream
American Research System - y Richard E. Sclove, Madeleine L. Scammell,
and Breena Holland Released July 22, 1998
Here's a piece from the report:
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY (abridged)
The United States is blessed with abundant resources, wealth and
dynamism, and yet burdened with profound social and environmental ills.
"We can put a man on the moon," goes the old saw, but why can�t we
empower distressed communities and groups to help understand and address
their own problems? The answer, it turns out, is not that no one knows
how to facilitate such empowerment; the organizations examined in this
study do it every day. The answer is that we aren�t properly investing
the resources readily available for building the social
infrastructure--a nationwide community research system--that would make
empowerment-through-mutual-learning universally accessible.
"Community-based research" is research that is conducted by, with, or
for communities (e.g., with civic, grassroots, or worker groups
throughout civil society). This research differs from the bulk of the
R&D conducted in the United States, most of which--at a total cost of
about $170 billion per year--is performed on behalf of business, the
military, the federal government, or in pursuit of the scientific and
academic communities� intellectual interests.
This study presents 12 case studies of U.S. community research centers
(one-third are located at universities and the others are independent
nonprofit organizations). Concrete changes that have occurred as a
result of community-based research projects conducted by these
organizations include:
Energy conservation retrofits of over 10,000 low-income housing
units in Chicago
One of the most thoroughly prepared legal cases in the history of
toxic waste litigation, two companies sued for wrongful death associated
with water pollution, and an $8 million out-of-court settlement with
Woburn, Massachusetts plaintiffs
A moratorium on forest logging pending the conclusion of
negotiations between Alaskan legislators and activists
Implementation of a new system for providing police service more
equitably in the Jacksonville, Florida area
A requirement that scientists seek permission from a Native
American community before including them as research subjects
Replacement of poisoned drinking water with a safe water line into
a rural Kentucky community, and a legal judgment requiring establishment
of an $11 million community health fund
Creation of a new health program in Chicago for refugee women
>From these cases, the study develops the most comprehensive overview
that exists to-date of the U.S. community research system, comparing it
with the institutionally more mature community research system that
exists in the Netherlands, as well as with the mainstream U.S. research
system. The report�s analysis is organized in terms of 18 findings,
among them:
Community-based research processes differ fundamentally from
mainstream research in being coupled relatively tightly with
community groups that are eager to know the research results and
to use them in practical efforts to achieve constructive social
change. Community-based research is not only usable, it is
generally used and, more than that, used to good effect.
Community-based research often produces unanticipated and far
reaching ancillary results, including new social relationships and
trust, as well as heightened social efficacy. It may thus provide
one constructive response to the growing concern that American
civil society is in crisis and unraveling.
There is significant demand for community-based research, and much
of it is not being met. The Loka Institute has so far been able to
identify about 50 U.S. community research centers, estimating
crudely that the total number of community research projects
conducted annually in the U.S. is somewhere between 400 and 1,200.
For there to be as many community research centers per capita in
the U.S. as already exist in the Netherlands, the U.S. would need
645 centers conducting about 17,000 studies annually.
Compared with conventional research, community-based research is
cost-effective. A typical community research project costs on the
order of $10,000, constructively addresses an important social
problem, provides tangible benefits to groups that are often among
society�s least advantaged, produces secondary social benefits
(such as enhancing participating students�
education-for-citizenship), and produces little or no unintended
social or environmental harm.
Most U.S. community research centers find their work chronically
constrained or even jeopardized by an inadequate funding base.
This study�s rough estimate is that both the U.S. and the
Netherlands currently spend on the order of US$10 million annually
on community-based research, which means that on a per capita
basis the Dutch are investing in community-based research at 15
times the U.S. rate. As a fraction of each nation�s respective
total R&D expenditure, the Dutch are investing in community-based
research at 37 times the U.S. rate.
While there are community research centers in the United States,
compared with the Netherlands these are few and far between,
relatively inaccessible to the groups that could most benefit from
them, and do not represent a comprehensive system. To create a
U.S. community research system that would provide service as
comprehensively and accessibly as does the Dutch system would cost
on the order of $450 million annually. That is about 45 times
current U.S. investment in community-based research, but would
still represent less than 0.3 percent of total U.S. R&D
expenditure (from all sources, public and private).
1998 The Loka Institute, Amherst, Massachusetts USA
Finally, and most impressivly, look at the review of their first
citizen's panel in the US: http://policy.rutgers.edu/papers/5.pdf.
They learned their lesson from the Netherlands. One method used there
involves selecting a group of regular citizens to answer a question
about a technical development - questions like the one you propose. But
the panel or jury is given resources and authority to thoroughly examine
an issue - call in experts ...
Tom Lowenhaupt
- - - - - - - - - -
GD>Karl Auerbach <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
snip
GD>I propose we try a small experiment.
GD>Have everyone on the ifwp list contact a small number of their friends or
acquaintances and give them this short survey:
GD>An organization called the ICANN is being formed that is going to set
GD>policy for the assignment of Internet domain names, addresses, and
GD>protocol values. Several methods of representation have been proposed GD>for
this organization. Please pick which of the methods you would feel best
represents you.
GD>* I would like to represent myself by direct participation
GD>* I would like to represent myself by proxy
GD>* I would like the organizations or companies that provide my
GD> Internet access to appoint someone in some official capacity to
GD> represent me
snip.
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