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 Controversy
and Politics
Participants
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Types of
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Active Participants
 Establishment
Position
- associated with government,
military, corporate industry or professional
organisations
- involvement generally occupational
eg public relations people, lawyers, experts, senior
executives, bureaucrats, presidents of
associations.
- usually support the
technology/project in question
Challenge
Position
- voluntary organisations such as
environmental and consumer groups, religious
organisations, ad hoc groups formed to fight that
particular issue or a set of related
issues
- mainly volunteer activists
- a few people involved as part of
their employment eg some environmentalists,
lawyers
- usually oppose the
technology/project in question
Passive Participants
General
Public
- express their views in a passive
way such as:
- referendum
- response to a question on an
opinion poll
- spend a day listening to rock
music at a demonstration
- generally support establishment
position
- can be swayed by
protest
- widespread support for science and
technology
- may be opposed technologies for
specific reasons
People who are active in a controversy
are a small proportion of the population and not
representative. Most of the time, however, the action of a
technical controversy is played out by the activists on
either side, who are few in number.
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