Bernard Delvaux

Knowledge, local actors and public action

Abstract What is the status and role in public action of the knowledge possessed by ‘simple’ citizens, users and professionals? That is the question broached in both this article and the entire special issue for which it serves as the introduction. To this end, we explore the abundant scientific literature pertaining to the topic and try to situate our own position within the broader setting. After discussing the gradual questioning of the social representations that have made scientific knowledge the ideal and standard by which we measure all knowledge, we argue that many authors with an essentialist approach to knowledge have stressed the differences between scientific knowledge and non-scientific knowledge, often leaving us at an impasse. We argue therefore that it is preferable to advance an approach in which knowledge is as at once relational and in a constant process of hybridization. Having opted for and justified this position, we then focus on the – hybrid – knowledge possessed by citizens, users and professionals, by first probing the reasons for the growing involvement of these actors in the production of knowledge and policies. We then ponder the nature and foundations of the complaints and criticisms frequently levelled at participatory mechanisms as to the actual role played in these areas by the knowledge held by ‘local’ actors. In the end, we identify proposals defended by certain authors to make the interactions of actors from different social worlds more symmetrical.

Qual é o papel do conhecimento na acção pública

Neste artigo, propomos analisar o papel do conhecimento na accao publica, adoptando uma perspectiva que se afasta quer da ideia que o conhecimento e um mero instrumento nas maos dos actores mais poderosos, quer, ao contrario, que e uma maneira eficaz de evitar a predominância dos interesses e das ideologias. O nosso quadro conceptual comeca com a analise do conhecimento usado para colocar problemas ou apresentar recomendacoes no topo da agenda. A circulacao desse conhecimento e entendida como sendo estruturada por circuitos de conhecimento, mais ou menos estaveis. Esses circuitos sao vistos como um dos quatro factores que estruturam o que acontece em cada uma das cenas, varias e interligadas, que estao envolvidas no processo de accao publica. Este quadro teorico ajuda a analisar nao so os estudos de caso especificos, mas tambem as variacoes do lugar ocupado pelo conhecimento, em funcao do tempo, dos paises e dos sectores em que se exerce a accao publica.

L'échec scolaire en Belgique

SUMMARY In Belgium, the French and Flemish Communities differ in the way pupils’ failures are identified and dealt with, the two communities being widely autonomous in terms of educational policy. The Flemish Community clearly prefers to promote pupils rather than hold them back. While the French Community has long favoured a policy of holding pupils back, efforts are now being made to reduce such practice. Owing to the resistance of a large number of families in refusing to have their child redirected along socially less popular educational paths, these efforts have met with little success so far. How can these differences between the two communities be explained? Although it suggests a few explanatory hypotheses, this paper is mostly a descriptive account, comparing the two communities in terms of the laws and policies they have implemented, and in terms of statistics. Such a comparison has never previously been attempted systematically.