The course brought together 20 PhD candidates from a range of institutions and disciplines. A central feature of the programme was the presentation and discussion of participants’ own research papers, and in addition to paper sessions, participants attended keynote lectures that engaged with themes from the course readings and stimulated broader conversations about contemporary research. The course featured keynote lectures by Valérie November, Research Director at the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) and researcher at the Laboratoire Techniques, Territoires et Sociétés (LATTS), Brice Laurent, Senior Researcher at the Centre de Sociologie de l’Innovation (CSI) and Director of the Social Sciences, Economy and Society Department at ANSES (the French Agency for Food, Environmental and Occupational Health & Safety), and Liliana Doganova, Professor of Sociology at Mines Paris – PSL and researcher at the Centre de Sociologie de l’Innovation (CSI), France.
Keynotes and papers focused on the relationship between democracy and crisis, and course participants collectively examined how democratic orders are maintained, challenged, and transformed through controversies surrounding expertise, environmental issues, public trust, and competing valuations.
The course was convened by Professor Kristin Asdal (TIK Centre for Technology, Innovation and Culture, University of Oslo) and Professor Helge Jordheim (Department of Culture, Religion, Asian and Middle Eastern Studies/GLOBE, University of Oslo), who both also lectured at the course. The combination of keynote lectures, peer feedback, and collaborative discussion created a dynamic environment for intellectual exchange and the further development of doctoral research projects.
Special thanks to Marte Mangset and Yann Hascoët at CUSP.
