Abstract

VASEN, Federico. The meanings of relevance in science policies. Rev. iberoam. cienc. tecnol. soc. [online]. 2011, vol.7, n.19, pp.11-46. ISSN 1850-0013.

The conception of "relevance" that is implied in every science policy is one of its most political components, since it enables the judgment on which kind of research should be promoted and  summarizes the objectives of the whole policy. This article aims to explore the history of science policy in the 20 Century and seeks to identify the conceptions of relevance present in it both at a global and Latin American level. It is noted that the main discontinuity between the two agendas can be found in the late 1960s and early 1970s when a socio-environmental sense of relevance emerged in the global scene, but the Latin American reflections showed a radicalization of the previous national sense of relevance into a revolutionary one. Finally, in the last section, a new public sense of relevance for current science policies is proposed to increase participation of marginal actors in research agenda-setting processes.

Keywords : Filosofía de la política científica; Relevancia; América Latina; Philosophy of Science Policy; Relevance; Latin America.

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