Lately, I have been thinking a bit about the issue of being 'critical' in academic work or more precisely about the stand of position of the these very classical positions within humanities and social research. What are these researchers hoping to change and how? What is the raison d'^Etre of social sciences? When thinking of personalities such as Habermas, Giddens, Bourdieu etc.The question may seem rather mondane and maybe a bit silly to ask.
I guess when staying in the framework of the traditional Marxist views of in the social sciences the issue around overcoming capitalism, is central. Recently, I found a definition by Habermas stating that rather than having an anti-capitalist approach an letting the defeat of capitalism be the main aim the stand should rather be emancipatory; for Habermas this means that discourses should be emancipated, from colonialisation. So, what when techologies, objects and the claimed move of the sts field of having moved to a post-humanistic stand? Anne Marie Mol writes in a paper somewhere (with John Law) that sts should rather pursue the aim of localising universal scientific facts to the very local field to analyse; a stand that aims at 'wrestling' away the power of science. In many ways I believe that this stand is no longer completely given in the social sciences, which once again emphasises the need to be reflective in methodology-wise. Why are we here and what is this piece of research good for? What impacts are we aiming to create?
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