Global Trust Levels: The study surveyed over 71,000 individuals across 68 countries and found that, on average, people have moderately high trust in scientists, with a global mean score of 3.62 out of 5.
Regional Insights: In Côte d’Ivoire, where I supervised data collection, the trust score was slightly below the global average at 3.59/5, while in Morocco, it was higher at 3.68/5.
Public Engagement: A significant majority (83%) of respondents worldwide believe that scientists should actively engage in policymaking and communicate their findings to the public. (nature.com)
As researcher and founder of Africitizen, this study underscores the importance of open, participatory science in strengthening public trust and ensuring data-driven decision-making. Open Science Hardware plays a crucial role in democratizing scientific knowledge and making data collection more accessible and transparent for all.
Discussion Points:
Enhancing Trust: How can the OScH community contribute to building and maintaining public trust in science, especially in regions with varying trust levels?
Policy Engagement: What strategies can we employ to encourage scientists’ involvement in policymaking and public discourse?
I look forward to your insights and suggestions on these topics. Let’s work together to promote open science and strengthen the relationship between science and society.
Dear @TOKO , I would be really interested to discuss and collaborate on this topic, the relationship between science and society (preferably democracy too) has been a long-standing research interest for me, even though I have been critical of blind trust to scientists (if you’re interested in my work, i can point you where to find most of it on researchgate).
The link between science, society, and democracy is a topic that also interests me. I believe that applied science, inspired by complex public problem, can better inform public policies and have a concrete impact on community life. In my view, this contributes to strengthening democracy, especially on the African continent.
With Africitizen, we work in this direction by engaging communities in data production and the development of practical solutions tailored to their realities.
I would love to learn more about your work and explore potential synergies for collaboration. We could arrange a meeting to discuss this further if you’re interested.
Glad to arrange a meeting (we can exchange messages however for that, either here or elsewhere, are you on facebook or viber/whatsapp/signal? Let me know if you’re on one of these platforms and we can exchange details privately)!
Actually, I was ready to tell you that we may differ in our degree of appreciation for science, but really, I have much to agree with what you say about your work with Africitizen, that you encourage people to gather their own data and try to implement tailored practical solutions! My criticism is more addressed to unearned trust and the lack of criticism for scientist policy-makers - the lack of criticism stemming from a gap in knowledge.
Though at the same time, I try to always consider times when science clashes with traditional knowledge and perhaps even habits. It’s especially within this context that I’m often critical of ‘science’ in the abstract - for example I’d support something like ‘african science’ where people would examine traditional practices and may even derive some wisdom from them.
I think one of the downfalls of incorporating TEK in Western science is that it has been coming from the perspective of western science being superior, and sort of ‘validating’ TEK with it. Whereas TEK stands on its own, as it has since time immemorial.
I also agree that blind faith in science as a process, or perhaps more accurately, scientists as objective observers leads to issues, including a lack of trust in the process. Yet in general policy is almost never based on the best available science. It’s more based on value systems and prior beliefs, in my experience.
Dear @AsymptoticAspiration , do you have hands-on experience in science for policy? Asking as my experience is purely academic, so that’s a big caveat for me, in that you may skip everything I say as non-expert (and here’s another problem, at least something that has bothered me, to what extent should non-experts barge in to science for policy conversations).
Anyway, with the caveat out there, I’d like to say that probably there is good enough available science input into policy, maybe not the best available science as this may not have become consensual and mainstream yet. However, I think (again, not having been involved hands-on in policy or science for policy) that policy ought to be based on value systems (prior beliefs maybe not necessarily), in that the ‘scientific facts’ are not sufficient on their own to dictate what ‘ought to be done’ - at best they can only be necessary inputs, or, they can sketch the likely consequences of value-based choices.
As for TEK (is that technology? apologies for my ignorance), if TEK is indeed technology, yes, technology was ubiquitous and existed since time immemorial, whilst what gets sold as ‘Science’ (as the institution plus the activity) is what began in the 1650s by the Royal Society in the UK (even though some take the more inclusive view that Science the activity is just refined common sense and was also done elsewhere before London 1650.
TEK is indeed a perfect example of this issue. And yes, because this assessment of the incorporation of this knowledge into science by researchers located outside the context creates a perception of superiority or validation.
However, I think this is also normal, given the history and the cultural evolution dynamics of different regions. By building bridges of collaboration and promoting citizen science, as well as strengthening cooperation among researchers from different regions for the replicability of studies, and working to democratize access to scientific materials ( Open Sc Hardware), we will reach a consensus in perception and action toward a common goal. Because territories and problems are interconnected.
The acceptance of what you may call TEK into the body of let’s call it ‘certified scientific knowledge body’ only when the (western primarily) scientists validate it as such and explain it to themselves in their own (scientific) language used to be a big motivator for me to write my thesis, I was pretty much against it and thought that for example my grandma ought to be thought of having knowledge about say chickensoup for the cold before a scientist validates this. Anyway. I agree with you that it’s also a matter of history, and i’d add economics (imperialism etc). And given that I’m in the agreement mood today, I also agree with you that the ideal would be for collaboration on an equal footing and citizen science and indeed to view knowledge as a social good - even though part of the democratization movement may also be dangerous phenomena such as flat-earth or other various kinds of denialisms, stemming from a distrust of the Scientific Establishment (what do we do then, especially when citizens’ distrust sometimes starts from them learning that traditional science played a big role in setting up the various inequalities currently observed?)
