Author Archives

• Is America the New ‘Old Country’?

  By Steve Fuller on November 19, 2012 • ( 0 )

  The great journalist Walter Lippmann famously defined the twentieth century as the ‘American Century’. In 2012 the twentieth century is history: We’ve been there, done that. Now, it seems, America is the Old Country. The idea of countries being ‘old’… Read More ›

• If your bottom line as an academic is that the world is a complicated and uncertain place, then expect job replacement by a smart search engine

  By Steve Fuller on August 22, 2012 • ( 0 )

  Case in point: A bad analogy between UK Olympic funding and UK science policy funding. Clearly the author hasn’t thought through the idea that in a neo-liberal political economy, targets make all the difference – and the Olympics provided those,… Read More ›

• Wanted: Ph.D. student to put Harriet Martineau back in the sociological canon

  By Steve Fuller on July 26, 2012 • ( 0 )

  Harriet Martineau (1802-1876) was one of the most remarkable women of letters – perhaps ever. Her body of work ranged across the social and biological sciences and even theology. Wikipedia gives a good introduction to the breadth of her writing…. Read More ›

• Towards a Comtean Revival in Sociology

  By Steve Fuller on July 22, 2012 • ( 0 )

  I have been closely associated with the field of science and technology studies (STS) since my graduate student days, nearly thirty years ago. In 1984, as a PhD student in history and philosophy of science, I published the first piece… Read More ›

• Open access is no more than academic consumerism. It neither democratises knowledge production nor communication

  By Steve Fuller on April 23, 2012 • ( 7 )

  The Open Access movement should be seen for what it is – nothing more but nothing less than a consumerist revolt, academic style. No one in this revolt is calling for what is sometimes called ‘extended peer review’ (whereby relevant… Read More ›

• Is Precautionary the New Reactionary?

  By Steve Fuller on April 12, 2012 • ( 0 )

  In recent months, both sides of the Atlantic have witnessed renewed calls to apply the so-called Precautionary Principle to limit, if not outright, stop a variety of publicly and privately funded research and development projects around the topic of ‘synthetic… Read More ›

• SI Top 10 #5 – Response to George Monbiot’s Rant against Academic Publishers

  By Steve Fuller on December 27, 2011 • ( 1 )

  In the US, we have the phrase ‘waving a flag and kissing a baby’ for somebody who plays to the gallery. And this is exactly what George Monbiot has done in his Guardian rant against academic publishing houses. Running neck-and-neck… Read More ›

• Paul Krugman’s Rhetoric of ‘Anti-Science’: A Case of Ressentiment?

  By Steve Fuller on September 5, 2011 • ( 0 )

  Max Scheler, following up some clues in Nietzsche, developed a sociology of ‘ressentiment’, which – as a first pass — refers to the creation of scapegoats to deflect attention from one’s own inadequacies. Ressentiment was meant to explain how the… Read More ›

• Response to George Monbiot’s Rant against Academic Publishers

  By Steve Fuller on August 30, 2011 • ( 12 )

  In the US, we have the phrase ‘waving a flag and kissing a baby’ for somebody who plays to the gallery. And this is exactly what George Monbiot has done in his Guardian rant against academic publishing houses. Running neck-and-neck… Read More ›

• Response to Mark Carrigan’s “The ‘prestige’ of journals in a social media age”

  By Steve Fuller on August 29, 2011 • ( 0 )

  As it turns out, our new dept head has asked us to look over the new REF guidelines for comment this week, so this issue is fresh on my mind. What you say is interesting, especially if we’re talking about… Read More ›

• A sociological blog dedicated to ‘Humanity 2.0’

  By Steve Fuller on July 25, 2011 • ( 0 )

  Recently a videoclip of me giving one of the first TEDx lectures at Warwick was posted here on ‘Humanity 2.0’, which is about changing definitions of the human, an issue central to the past, present and future of the social… Read More ›

• Neo-Liberalism as Utopia

  By Steve Fuller on February 19, 2011 • ( 1 )

  During the ‘Discourses of Dissent’ conference, in response to Ruth Levitas’ presentation about the continuing need for utopias, I observed that Neo-Liberalism is a very potent example of a utopian vision that through what might be reasonably called a ‘conspiracy’… Read More ›

• Lincoln to re-connect the university with its roots

  By Steve Fuller on February 18, 2011 • ( 1 )

  Mike Neary, Professor of Teaching and Learning at Lincoln University, has just announced the formation of the Social Science Centre, which promises to be a self-organizing cooperatively owned corporation (with teachers and students as peers) devoted to higher education —… Read More ›

• Time to Revisit the Port Huron Statement?

  By Steve Fuller on February 18, 2011 • ( 0 )

  At the final discussion session of this week’s ‘Discourses of Dissent’ workshop in Birmingham, I raised the need for academics and students concerned about the future of the university to consolidate a positive position — something beyond simply protesting budget… Read More ›