Dear Reader !

This is the seventh issue of the CIPAST newsletter. This quarterly newsletter provides news on the situation of participatory procedures in Europe and news about the CIPAST project and its members.

Based on the results of the first CIPAST training workshop, held in Dresden, June 2006, the second CIPAST training workshop was now organized in Procida-Naples. The wonderful mediterranean atmosphere of the island of Procida in the Gulf of Naples and the phantastic organisation by the host Cittá della Scienza allowed a fruitful exchange of experience and expertise and offered much scope for establishing contacts or consolidating networking.

Yours sincerely,
Norbert Steinhaus, Editor

As citizens, do we have legitimacy to discuss emergence of new technologies? The answer is yes, this is our planet. Therefore the 2nd CIPAST training workshop „How to design and organise public deliberation" from June 17th to June 21st 2007 presented the state of the art of knowledge on public participation in science and technology and referred to concrete experiences in European countries. 80 participants from 20 countries enjoyed the wonderful Mediterranean atmosphere of the island of Procida in the Gulf of Naples which allowed a fruitful exchange of experience and expertise. The perfect organisation by the host Cittá della Scienza offered much scope for establishing contacts or consolidating networking.

In particular it identifies key persons or institutions that may concretely contribute to promote the development of participatory procedures in science and technology in their country. It also gives an overview of several past or ongoing participatory processes. In addition the database provides statistics on the kind of actors and thematic fields represented.

Data always is in a state of flux. Thus the CIPAST database will always be under construction what means constantly updated. Even though it does not pretend to be exhaustive, it provides reliable information about actors and participative processes in Europe.

The CIPAST database is meant as a tool for actors involved in science and technology issues. It has a special focus on technology assessment and citizen participation. The database aims at identifying key actors and giving an overview of past or ongoing participatory processes, in order to foster networking and experience sharing between STS actors throughout Europe. If you are interested to be listed in the database - either as actor, or with a process - you are kindly asked to fill the database registration forms on the CIPAST website.

Nanotechnology is fashionable and, like most new technologies, has had its potential over-hyped by many. (...) Nevertheless, the unique properties of materials at the nano-scale make this a fruitful area for development but, along with projected benefits come potential hazards. (...) Poorly handled, such issues have the potential to be a major public relations disaster in the similar way to GM crops.

One way to avoid this - pushed hard by the think tank Demos, among others - is public engagement. The concept is that, by involving lay people in the debate early on, concerns are raised and addressed and the direction of research influenced in ways which are likely to increase acceptance by society. This is the currently fashionable view of how relations between scientists and the public should be handled, replacing the ‚deficit model‘ addressed by the much-derided Public Understanding of Science (PUS) movement.