(C) Sergui Novac
The Moment We Realized What Democracy was About - Lecture at IWM
by Sergui Novac
As part of the Care chapter : Care for a Future, we will do an excursion to the Institute for Human Sciences (IWM) to hear
a talk by Sergui Novac.
http://www.iwm.at/events/event/the-moment-we-realized-what-democracy-was-about/
Please register where possible
http://www.iwm.at/events/event/the-moment-we-realized-what-democracy-was-about/
Please register where possible
Sergiu Novac
‘The Moment We Realized What Democracy was About’
Nuclear Controversies During German Re-Unification
4pm, Thursday 03 December 2015
Institut für die Wissenschaften vom Menschen (Institute for Human Sciences), Spittelauer Lände 3, 1090
Some recent strands of scholarship in the social sciences have been keen on stressing the importance of technical and scientific
controversies for more democratic forms of distributing power between the actors involved. This talk will engage with this
issue through the story of the few years (1989 – 1991) during which the fate of the Greifswald Nuclear Power Plant, the technological
pride of the GDR, was sealed. It will tell of a moment when two different states, international nuclear regulatory commissions,
nuclear operators, workers and concerned citizens entered a controversy that was truly unique. Based on ethnographic research,
the story reveals the expectations of and anxieties about ‘democracy’, itself a highly debated notion during those years,
of both pro- and anti-nuclear supporters from Greifswald. It is a story not about winners, but rather about shared disappointments
regarding different expectations. Moreover, the controversy in question reveals several key features about the way more recent
energy related debates, such as the Energiewende or the Atomausstieg have been handled in Germany.
Sergiu Novac is a PhD candidate in Sociology and Social Anthropology at the CEU in Budapest. Currently he is a CEU Junior
Visiting Fellow at the IWM.
The Moment We Realized What Democracy was About - Lecture at IWM
December 03, 2015, 4:00h
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Team
- Brishty Alam (Artistic and scientific assistance)
- Valerie Deifel (Artistic and scientific assistance)
- Bernd Kräftner (Artistic direction)