Article
ID: CBB797047150

On Staging Work: How Research Funding Bodies Create Adaptive Coherence in Times of Projectification (May 2022)

unapi
Technoscience; science and technology studies Science Research support 21st century

While recent science and technology studies literature focuses on “projectification” and its felt tensions for researchers, a surprising scarcity of empirical work addresses experiences at the “other end,” such as funding bodies often held “responsible” for tensions encountered by researchers. Actors in funding bodies experience similar tensions, however. While projectification necessitates predictability and individual project objectives, research funding is also increasingly organized in networks promoting local experimentation. Moreover, funding bodies are part of a system of accountability in which investments are legitimized politically in often reductionist ways. We argue for the salience of more detailed empirical investigations into the work of funding bodies as they navigate these tensions. We apply a dramaturgical perspective to investigate the “staging work” of program committees responsible for the management of funded programs, identifying three forms of staging work: setting the scene, temporal narration, and signifying success. All come with discursive, material, and symbolic dimensions. We develop the notion “adaptive coherence” to show how the program committee sought to maintain the coherence of the overall program despite continuous risks of fragmentation due to projectification, local experimentation, and divergence in interests. “Adaptive coherence” proves productive in incorporating the temporal and spatial dimensions of staging work in networked contexts.

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Authors & Contributors
Roumbanis, Lambros
Chong, Phillipa
Jeon, June
Luis Humberto Fabila-Castillo
Boer, Bas de
Te Molder, Hedwig
Journals
Social Studies of Science
Science, Technology and Human Values
Tapuya: Latin American Science, Technology and Society
Centaurus: International Magazine of the History of Mathematics, Science, and Technology
Publishers
Routledge/Taylor & Francis Group
MIT Press
Concepts
Technoscience; science and technology studies
Science
Research support
Research
Regulation
Medicine
People
Trump, Donald H.
Latour, Bruno
Time Periods
21st century
20th century, late
20th century
Places
Germany
Great Britain
South Korea
United States
Sweden
Japan
Institutions
National Graphene Institute
Santa Fe Institute
Universities and colleges--Alumni and alumnae
UK Stem Cell Bank
United States. Environmental Protection Agency
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