Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin - RMZ

Annual Conference of the Finnish Political Science Association 2024: Democracy, knowledge and expertise

University of Turku, Finland (online)

Part of the Workshop 14 "Science as Argument. Academic contributions to political debates" chaired by Taru Haapala and Kari Palonen.

Presentation by Lise Moawad: Evidence-based policymaking and social sciences. MPs expectations in France, Germany, and the UK (2012-2022)

Abstract: 

The relationship between evidence-based policymaking and social sciences has always been challenging (Stocker and Evans 2016). In an ideal-typical policy process, the actors are assumed to be rational, the decision-making process to be linear, and the evidence to be… evident. In reality, this policy model fails to understand comprehensively societies and the relationships among individuals within those societies. Indeed, it does not consider either the cognitive limits of policymakers, for instance, or the unpredictability of the environment (Cairney 2016). Yet it is precisely what characterise social sciences: the instability of its main subject, the difficult construction of grand theories, and the extent of disagreement over the quality of the material that can be mobilised as evidence. In other words, these disciplines are often unsuccessful in providing turnkey solutions (Parsons 2002). The institutionalisation of the difference between qualitative and quantitative approaches has contributed to weakening the status of social sciences evidence (Becker 2020).
And yet, the social sciences are still mobilised by policymakers, in polarised exchanges when it comes to determining the political role assigned to researchers from these disciplines (Albæk 1995; Benneworth and Jongbloed 2010). One example of a microcosm where this phenomenon can be observed systematically is parliaments, which make ranks and numbers visible. In this presentation, I would first like to understand what MPs expect from the social sciences in terms of scientific results. Secondly, I will attempt to address the corollary question of whether social sciences evidence can be freely debated and shared in parliaments. Through the rhetorical analysis of parliamentary debates (Wiesner et al. 2017) in Germany (Bundestag), France (Assemblée Nationale) and the UK (House of Commons) over the period 2012-2022, I will try to study two aspects. On the one hand, how knowledge and levels of evidence are prioritised in MPs' discourses. Secondly, how the observation of the existence of multiple 'regimes of truths' (Foucault 2001) is transformed, in parliamentary debates, into an indictment of relativism.

More information:

https://sites.utu.fi/politiikantutkimuksenpaivat/en/