Session Information
Contribution
Description: Today the thesis of a globalised knowledge society and of a worldwide and universal scientific system seems to be evident. A view on today's scientific conferences or task forces and their composition of participants demonstrates that, on the formal organisational level, internationalisation and globalisation are already well established in the ongoing procedures of the sciences.But what's about globalisation on a more content level? Is the idea of an universal and common knowledge, independent of the conditions of construction, the consequences and impacts of the cultural divers constitutions to be taken for granted - especially in the social sciences? (in general i.e. Knorr Cetina). For the most research studies the findings of cultural sciences are widely ignored today. This can be said for topics from moral studies up to PISA of nowadays: most studies assume that they compare comparable things while using more or less identical testing designs worldwide - without questioning comparability itself. These studies operate on hidden presumptions about the universality of knowledge and scientific theories. But this practice comes more and more under pressure and critics, especially by non-western, often postcolonial scientific contexts. With the formula of "Indigeneity" (see i.e. Mukherji & Sengupta) they express resistance and unwillingness to accept the default scientific values of the West. It seems extremely interesting to analyse this knowledge processing and to recontextualise it with regard to (scientific) knowledge transformation in general.A deeper understanding of this scenario requires attention to the difference between universality as a general formula for self observation and norm in science and between globalisation as an observable attribute of science - that means as an external description of the structure of the scientific system and the worldwide penetration of more or less coherent means - as Rudolf Stichweh puts it. While there is no pluralism of scientific systems observable and thereby globalisation means that the scientific system is without competition, the universality of science is (only) an invention and strategy which, in return, enables globalisation.
Methodology: Following Niklas Luhmann for theoretical reflection the systems theory will be used. His distinction between the code true/untrue of the scientific system and the corresponding programs (methods and theories in the sciences) indicates the contingencies of scientific objects and therefore also of knowledge at all. Focusing on contingencies allows a sharper concentration on plurality of scientific cultures. With the concept of externalisation of reflexion in the scientific system there is a theoretical construction at hand with which one can try to dissolve the superficial incompatibleness of universality and indegneity and to reach new perspectives.
Conclusions: Taking into account that Jürgen Schriewer is interpreting 'internationalisation' as an externalisation strategy of the educational discussion in the western context, it will be discussed whether in return the 'indigenisation' of science in non-western contexts could be understood as an externalisation strategy using history, tradition and values instead. In this perspective we can try to come to a new base for analysing the transformation processes of scientific knowledge.
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