Consumers and Nanotechnology: Deliberative Processes and Methodologies

In recent years, questions democratic influence on science and technology has received much attention. The lesson from the European unrest over GMO is that consumer-citizens will react negatively to just having to accept the introduction of new, partly untested technologies. A number of political bodies have started to involve citizens and to consider their concerns, attitudes, hopes, and worries in an early stage of the coming nano revolution. An international consortium of experts mapped a large number of these deliberations, mainly in the European Union and the United States, and proceeded to give closer analysis of a selection of those that were found most interesting. The second part of the book analyzes seven citizen-oriented deliberations. The third part of the book looks into a set of more stakeholder-oriented deliberations.