Nanotechnology, Governance, and Knowledge Networks in the Global South

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-xiii

   PDF

2. Introduction “The Power of Small”

   • Marcela Suárez Estrada

   Pages 1-10

3. Assembling Power, Agencies, and Governance in Nanotechnology Networks

   • Marcela Suárez Estrada

   Pages 11-29

4. Envisioning a Better Future for Mexico Through Nanodiscourses

   • Marcela Suárez Estrada

   Pages 31-45

5. Linking Governance, Agencies, and Knowledge Networks at CIMAV

   • Marcela Suárez Estrada

   Pages 47-65

6. CIMAV and the Weaving of Global Knowledge Networks

   • Marcela Suárez Estrada

   Pages 67-87

7. Conclusions: From the Power of Small to Global Governance

   • Marcela Suárez Estrada

   Pages 89-95

8. Back Matter

   Pages 97-101

   PDF

The seemingly unlimited technological potential of nanotechnology brings with it new practices of governance, networking, and exercising power and agency. Focusing on scholars in the Global South, this text covers nanotechnology discourses, imaginaries, and materialities as they circulate and interact within governance knowledge networks. Rather than adapt their actions to existing governance mechanisms and science, technology, and innovation policy, scientists use the imaginary of nanotechnology to create new symbolic and material incentives, thus shaping its governance. By tracing the constantly shifting asymmetries of knowledge and power, the book offers fresh insights into the dynamics of knowledge networks. 

• Nanotechnology
• Science and Technology Studies
• Knowledge Networks
• Transnational Knowledge Networks
• Mexico
• Innovation Policy
• Policy Incentives
• Asymmetries of Knowledge

“This is a great new take on knowledge networks: that they are not floating freely in the air, but are situated in space, full of asymmetric power relations, blocking and excluding as much as sustaining the making of knowledge. Yet they are not structurally fixed, instead representing the dynamic outcome of constant negotiation and contestation. After this book, knowledge networks will no longer be the same!” (Jan-Peter Voß, Assistant Professor of Sociology, Technische Universität Berlin, Germany)

“This book makes a welcome contribution to STS scholarship by analyzing the dynamics of knowledge networks of nanotechnology from the perspective of the Global South. It persuasively proposes a new stage in the analysis of networks of governance—conceiving them as complex phenomena in terms of the asymmetries, representations, and discourses in constant motion in the exercising of power by scientists.” (Hebe Vessuri, Principal Researcher at the IPCSH, CONICET, Argentina)

• Berlin, Germany

  Marcela Suárez Estrada

Marcela Suárez Estrada is a research fellow and lecturer at the Lateinamerika-Institut at Freie Universität Berlin, Germany. 

Policies and ethics