Review: Following Scientists Around

Author(s): Steven Shapin

Reviewed work(s):
Science in Action: How to Follow Scientists and Engineers through Society by Bruno
Latour
Source: Social Studies of Science, Vol. 18, No. 3 (Aug., 1988), pp. 533-550
Published by: Sage Publications, Ltd.
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/285237
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ESSAY REVIEW

Following Scientists Around

Steven Shapin

Bruno Latour, Science in Action: How to Follow Scientists and Engineers throughSociety (Milton Keynes, Bucks.: Open University Press;
Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1987), 274 pp., ?25,
?9.95 pbk. ISBN 0-335-15357-7 (6-9 pbk).
Bruno Latour has been following scientists around for years. Now
he wants us to follow him following them around.He offers studentsof
science and technology a detailed map that will allow us to follow him
easily. He defines the nature, scope and terms of the exercise; he even
inventsa name - 'technoscience'- for its objectof study. In unmistakably French fashion he gives us 'rules of method' and 'principles',
numberedand ordered. No one following Latour is meant to get lost
or to strayoff the line of march. Stragglerswill have no excuses. There
has never been a programmefor researchin the social studiesof science
that has been presented in such a systematic and integratedway. This
is no mere supplementto our existinginterpretativerepertoires,no piecemeal compilationof case-studies. It is not meant to be slotted into the
relativistor the 'social constructivist'agendas, whose research, in any
case, is said to be fundamentallymisconceived. This is offered as a new
programmefor empirical and theoreticalwork that has the capacity to
keep us occupiedinto the foreseeablefuture.Latour'sbook will receive,
and it deserves to receive, the closest and most widespreadattention.
Indeed, the generalperspectivedeveloped by Latourand his colleagues
in Paris is already being, to use Latour'slanguage, 'black-boxed'into
a matter-of-factresource for researchin the social studies of science.1
The study of technoscienceunderLatour'sleadershippromises to be
great fun. He is clearly enjoying himself immensely. He writes with
Social Studies of Science (SAGE, London, Newbury Park, Beverly Hills and
New Delhi), Vol. 18 (1988), 533-50

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panache, charm and infectious wit.2 This is one of the funniest books
in a discipline which is well-endowed with funny-men. (Much of the
book's residualFranglais has got to be intentional!)The hilarious and
well-judged caricatureof the history of ideas tradition(132-36) alone
is worth the purchaseprice. If many of us are going to be victims of
the Latourianwar against existing tendencies in the social studies of
science, we may as well die laughing. Ave Bruno, moriturite salutant.
The Technoscientific War
The military (Machiavellian,Hobbesian, Nietzschean)metaphoris, of
course, Latour's trade mark, and it is basic to his understandingof
scientific and technological activity.3 Technoscience is war conducted
by muchthe samemeans.Its objectis dominationandits methodsinvolve
the mobilization of allies, their multiplicationand their drilling, their
strategicand forcefuljuxtapositionto the enemy. This agonistic model
has, beyond doubt, picked out and stressed features of science and
technology which other perspectives have missed or systematically
undervalued.To those raised on the functionalistidiom which insisted
upon the harmonioussolidarity of the scientific community, Latour's
'red-in-tooth-and-claw'sociology will come as a violent shock. Indeed,
his whole enterpriseis little more than the systematicworking-through
of the military metaphor, and, ultimately, its designation as a literal
depiction of science and technology.
The basic elementsof Latour'saccountmay be reasonablywell known
from his previous writings.4Science and technology are informedby a
Drang an Macht.Its actorswork out theirimpulsesto grow, to transform
themselves from 'micro-actors'to 'macro-actors'.This they do vampire
fashion:by subduingothers,by insinuatingthemselvesinto others'bodies
andby turningtheminto agentsof theirown volition. Successfulscientific
and technological enterprisesare manifestationsof the triumphof the
will. The laboratoryis not a peacefulretreatfrom politicalandeconomic
struggles that rage outside. It is a great battlefield upon which most
combatantsare slaughteredand from which only the strongwalk away.
War is usuallyunderstoodas a meansto an end: in itself it yields nothing
but corpses and heroes, and it has rarely been justified as worthy in its
own right. Science and technology, however, are productive. They
produce facts and machines, and these constitute their justifications.
What are the means of technoscientificwar and how do they produce
these goods? If scientists and engineers are trying to impose their will

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535

upon others, let us imagine an actor who resists and let us follow him
as he attemptsto maintainhis resistance. If he resists a simple scientific
assertion about a matterof fact, he can be shown a textual display of
allies that vouch for the claim, and thathe will have to confrontshould
he not submit. Initially, we are still in a paper world and the allies take
the form of cited authorities:'if you don't believe me, take a look at
all the other scientists who supportme'. Rhetoric, then, is the generalissue weapon of scientific armies, and Latour's account is founded on
a rhetoricalanalysisof scientificactivity.Scientificfactsare madethrough
rhetoricalmanoeuvringwith grammatical'modalities':positivemodalities
making statementshard, negative modalities making them soft. When
the statementsbecome hard enough, they may be inserted into other
statementswithout modificationor justification:they are facts, and, as
such, they can be made into allies for furtherclaims to facticity.
The fate of a statementis not determinedby its contentor its structure,
nor by the individual who first made it, nor by the context in which
it was initially made. Fact-making is a collective business and it is
extended in time. Statementscan only become facts if they are noticed
and used without modificationby others. Moreover, the status of any
statement cannot be guaranteed against the fact-destroying activity
of others, in other places, at other times. 'The status of a statement
dependson later statements'(27). Presumably,though withoutexplicit
acknowledgement,Latouris here affiliating himself with a version of
philosophicalfinitism familiar from the work of Hesse and Barnes:
concept applicationis open-endedand revisable; nothing in the nature
of reality and nothing about past usage determines how terms are
employed.5 Statementsare endemically vulnerableto users' decisions:
do users take any notice? do they modify the statements?reject them?
incorporatethem in other statements?
The recalcitrantreaderhas now been shown the forces arrayedagainst
his resistance, and, therefore, the price to be paid should he continue
to deny the truth of what is asserted. As he persists in his resistance,
the debatebecomesat once more 'technical'andmore 'social'. It becomes
technical because the doubterhas to be shown in the text what claims
(and who) he must also doubt if he wants to doubt this one. It becomes
more social because allies are being mobilized and enemies are being
isolated. In general, the technical appearanceof scientific literature
consists, Latoursays, in nothing but its social character,its display of
phalanxesof armedallies makingit pointlessto resist. 'If being isolated,
besieged, and left without allies and supportersis not a social act, then
nothingis. ... This literatureis so hardto readandanalysenot becauseit

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escapes from all normal social links, but because it is more social than
so-called normalsocial ties' (62). Latourthus majesticallysweeps aside
one of the majorobstaclesblockingthe progressof the sociologists'army:
the dualistic opposition between what is 'scientific' or 'technical' and
what is 'social'.
The scientific literaturedisplays the cost of doubting, but doubt, as
Latourrecognizes, may still be persisted with. The show of the instruments of torturemay not be enough for the committedheretic;they may
have to be appliedto his flesh. The doubtermay resistall mere rhetorical
tricks; he may want to follow the scientist into the actual place where
the work is done: the laboratory. He may want to see the reality that
is said to 'lie behind' the text. What he sees there raises the cost of
resistancestill further.If you don't believe the representationsproduced
by your antagonist, you will ultimately have to learn to make them
yourself. More than that, you will be obliged to build your own instruments and to gatherthem into one place. You will, that is to say, have
to secure the resources to construct a 'counter-laboratory'.
At each stage of doubt, the cost of resistanceis increased.It becomes
both economicallyand morallyharderto continuerefusingone's assent.
On the one hand, you will have to build your own laboratoryto contest
the claims; on the other, you will have to impugn the competence or
good faith of those you choose to disbelieve. The financial cost is
impossibleto bear;the social cost is alienation.Latour'sshaggy-dogstory
comes to a pragmaticend. More, and morepowerful,allies are mobilized
and juxtaposedto the forces of doubt. In principle, doubt may be continued indefinitely; in practice, doubters give up. The laboratoryacts
on resisterslike a Romanphalanxactedon disorganizedbarbarianrabble:
The laymanis awed by the laboratoryset-up, and rightlyso. Thereare not manyplaces
underthe sun where so manyand such hardresourcesare gatheredin so greatnumbers,
sedimented in so many layers, capitalised on such a large scale... [C]onfrontedby
laboratorieswe are simply and literally impressed. We are left without power . .to
dispute the spokesmen's authority. (93)

Disciplining and Persuading

The collective natureof fact-makingand machine-makingprecipitates
an apparentparadox.You wantto makeyourself great, to secure authorship for your own creation. But to do so you need a multitudeof allies.
How to enlist theirassistanceand, at the sametime, to ensurethatthey do
not modify the claim or the device out of all recognition?You have both
to 'enrol' and to 'control'. One way to enrol others is straightforward:

Essay Review: Shapin: Following Scientists Around

537

you can cater for potential allies' 'explicit interests'. You shape your
claim or your machine so that others will immediatelybelieve it or buy
it. However, if you do this you will not grow great yourself; your
authoritywill not be enhancedor even recognized;you will merely help
othersto grow. You can always get allies to marchin the directionthey
already want to go, but that is unlikely to do you much good. So what
you must do is to translatetheir interestsinto your preferredcourse of
action, to get them 'to follow us ratherthanthe otherway around'(111).
There are many strategiesthat may be used to effect this translation.
You can, for example, tell people that their goals are unrealizableas
presentlyconceived, thatthey can attainthem if only they make a short
detour from the route of marchthey are on already. Scientists who tell
industryand the militarythat they can only get useful outcomes if they
make a detour into basic research are trying to achieve this type of
translation.Still, thereare limits to translationsthatdependupon others'
explicit interests. Better to outflank the explicit purposes of potential
allies. You can give people's objectives different interpretationsthan
is customary;you can invent new objectives and try to sell them to a
group; you can try to create a new group with characteristicsyou have
custom-tailored;you can tell a group that the detour you propose isn't
very long, all the time keepingthemmoving in your preferreddirection.
Best of all you can make yourself indispensableto allies. Indeed, this
is a descriptionof the stateof affairsthatexists whenyou have succeeded.
You no longerhaveto sell yourproduct,becauseyourgoods havebecome
simply necessary for an arrayof allies to achieve their purposes. Your
productis then a black-box. The thermometeris, for example, used by
laymenand scientistsfor a wide rangeof purposes;no one has to display
andjustify the physical principles underlyingits use in order to get on
with the job of taking a reading; such readingsmust be taken in order
for any numberof other tasks to be realized;and any attemptto dispute
the legitimacy of thermometricmeasures of physical reality will be
strenuouslyopposed by almost all the world. If you achieve this kind
of success, you (your statement, apparatus,place of work) will have
become an 'obligatory point of passage' (120-21, 132, 141, 150-51,
156, 162).6
Having enrolled your allies, you must now make sure that they keep
in line, particularlythat they don't transformyour creation so that it is
no longerrecognizableas yours. The thingmustspread,butit mustspread
as 'the same' thing that you producedat the start of the process. You
control your enrolled allies and make them predictableby building up
a networkof elements aroundthe thing in question, linking 'the fate of

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the claim with so many assembled elements that it resists all trials to
break it apart' (122). Here, too, matters become highly 'technical'.
Pasteurinterestedfarmersin his anthraxvaccine, but he was in danger
of losing theirinterestif he could not get the bacilli to behavethemselves
properly.He hadto makethe behaviourof boththe bacilliandthe farmers
predictable.This involved 'technicalities'like findingpreciselythe right
temperatureat which to culturethe germs so that the farmerscould and
would use the vaccine reliably. You must, in Latour'susage, construct
a 'machine' in which the assembledelements are tied to one anotherand
act as a whole. 'When such cohesion is obtainedwe at last have a black
box' (131). Once you have done that, no one can tamperwith any one
componentwithouterodingthe functioningof the entire machine. 'Dissent has been made unthinkable' (133). The strength of the Roman
phalanxdidnotarisefromthe numbersit containedbutfromits disciplined
coordination.

Actor-Networks
Latour's 'networks' are heterogeneousin their composition. They contain entities we are accustomed to call 'things' as well as those we
are used to designate as 'people'. Anything can be an 'actant' or an
'actor' in technoscientificnetworks.Latour'serosionof the conventional
boundariesseparatingpolitics from science is predicatedupon the insistence that objects and non-humanentities as well as people are political
beings. Things belong to the study of political order as much as human
agents. Thus, Pasteur's network contained both bacilli and farmers;
GeorgeEastman'sincludedphotographicemulsionandan inventedgroup
of camerausers;RobertBoyle's tied togetheran air-pump,an operational
vacuum, moderateAnglicanclerics and politicaltheorists.The ingenuity
of the scientist or engineer - that which defines his identity - is his
ability 'to includein the same repertoireof ploys humanand non-human
resources'(125). Latourregardsit as a greatmistaketo decidein advance
what alliances are composed of: whether their elements are human or
non-human,whetherthey are subjectiveor objective. We have only to
ask whether an association is stronger or weaker than another. Technology and science are the activities that build strong alliances out of
heterogeneouscomponents. They are, Latoursays, 'so much the same
phenomenon that I was right to use the same term black-box...to
designatetheir outcome' (131). This, then, is the definitionof 'technoscience', the thing Latour's enterprise aims to understand.

Essay Review: Shapin: Following Scientists Around

539

An importantconsequence flows from this for our perceptionof the

boundaries between 'science' and 'society', and for our view of the
proper scope of 'sociology'. Because the networks which confront us
are composed of both human and non-humanelements, we never see
'science' and 'society' separately,only strongerandweakerassociations.
'Scientific' work is also 'social' work, or, as it might be put, solutions
to the problemof knowledgeare solutionsto the problemof social order.
'Society' is constructedand stabilizedat the same time that 'facts' and
'machines' are constructed. From this observationLatourdraws both
optimistic and pessimistic conclusions for the scope of sociological
accountingin the study of technoscience. On the one hand, sociology
can go anywhere:there is nothing in science and technology, however
technical and esoteric, which is beyond the sociologist's properambit.
On the other, the resources the sociologist can use to say intelligible
things about science and technology are drasticallycurtailed. Because
the order of society is the outcome of settled controversies, Latourwill
not allow us to invoke 'society' (or 'social factors') 'to explain how and
why a controversy has been settled' (144).
Since 'actornetworks'are heterogeneous,they may extend anywhere
in nature or in society. They may reach from the virus to Versailles;
indeed, the virologistmustenlist allies in the corridorsof power in order
to do his workandto createhis objects.Latourstudieswhatis customarily
called the 'professionalization'of science in terms of the enrolmentof
allies in society andthe translationof theirinterests.The professionalization of science is to be understoodas the constitutionof the laboratory
as an 'obligatorypoint of passage'. Thus, Latourfollows the work that
precipitatesthe recognizedboundariesdividing 'science' from 'society'
and 'politics', while denying those boundariesany analytic legitimacy.
He gives a new twist to our understandingof 'science policy' and of
the basis of the 'purity' of 'pure science'. Laboratorywork becomes
more and more 'technical'just in order to enrol and discipline allies,
including politicians and industrialists. Its apparentindependenceis,
consequently,precisely the resultof the political work done in enrolling
these allies. 'Those who are really doing science are not all at the bench;
on the contrary, there are people at the bench because many more are
doing the science elsewhere' (162). So much for the boundarybetween
the 'internal' and the 'external'.
Latouris one of the very few studentsof modern science and technology who recognizes the fundamentalimportanceof the links which
bind these activities to the military. This is not because he adopts any
readily discernibleanti-militaristicstance (Latour'sposition appearsto

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be somewhere between even-handedand above it all), but because he

wants to follow technoscientificactor-networkswherever they go. The
militaryis a naturalally for scientistswantingto recruitandcontrolallies
simply because the military has abundantexperience in 'enrolling,
disciplining, drillingand keeping in line'. If you can sell to the military,
you can buy into theirnetworks.More fundamentally,technoscienceand
the military have the same problem: that of winning. The similarity
between 'the proof race andthe armsrace' is, in the end, not a metaphor.
They are, for Latour, the same sort of activity: 'technoscience is part
of a war machine and should be studied as such' (172).
The remainderof Latour'sbook uses actor-networktheory to reconceptualizea series of problemsusuallyassignedto the domainsof macrosociology, anthropologyand longue dureehistoriography.For example,
he dissolves the categories 'belief and 'knowledge', 'rationality'and
'irrationality',into the geometry and dynamicsof intersectionsbetween
differentactor-networks.The 'GreatDivide' between rationaland irrational cannot refer to what is believed and how inferences are made,
since the accusations can always, as a matter of principle, be turned
around(188-95). Instead,the designationsproperlyreferto appearances
generatedas the result of certainkinds of contact between membersof
different networks. The Great Divide is a summary of how matters
outside scientific networksappearwhen looked at from within. In turn,
it is a functionof the transitstracedby technoscientifictravellerscrossing
a series of other cultureswith the intentionof coming back and telling
stories. The cultures thus transittedby 'these peculiar travellers sent
away in orderto come back are going to appearby comparison"local",
"closed", "stable", "culturallydetermined"'(211). We get the impression that rules of logic have been broken, but we are only seeing the
result of certain kinds of dynamic interaction between networks of
different 'scale'.
From what sources do such differences in scale arise? In what do the
differences between great and small, strong and weak, consist? Latour
deals with these questionsthrougha study of imperialism.He wants to
identify the bases of dominationwhich imperialismshareswith technoscience. Ultimately, the power to dominate consists in the differential
possession of knowledge.7One group can get the edge on anotherif it
can more effectively gatheranddistributerelevantknowledge.The sailor
who is seeing a dangerousreef for the secondtime is moreknowledgeable
than one who is seeing it for the first time. Forewarnedis forearmed.
How is it possible for those who have not yet physically gone out to
the reef to have seen it already? How can you act at a distance? The

Essay Review: Shapin: Following Scientists Around

541

answer is straightforward:you bring the reef home and show it about.

Of course, there are certainpracticalproblemsassociatedwith shipping
distant objects like reefs back home, so what you do is to manipulate
the scale of the thing in question so that it is more easily portableand
so thatthe largestnumberof peopleat home can havethe sameexperience
of it. In Latour'sterminology, you achieve this by creatingscaled-down
'immutablemobiles', entitiesthatretaintheirshapewhile beingmultiplied
indefinitelyandcombinedin an indefinitenumberof ways: charts,tables,
maps, logs, plans, lists.
Latourends wherehe begins:in a paperworld. The basisof domination
is the accumulationin certain 'centres of calculation' of mountainsof
inscribed paper. This paper world is what allows its manipulatorsto
dominatethe real world. The objects of technoscience, no matterwhat
their size, 'all end up at such a scale that a few men or women can
dominatethem by sight; at one point or another,they all take the shape
of a flat surfaceof paper...; they all help to reversethe balanceof forces
between those who master and those who are mastered'; 'it is simply
a questionof scale' (255, 227). Technoscienceis trulya paperwar. Paper
is at once the battlefield and the ultimate weapon.

Interesting Sociology
C'est la guerre, mais est-ce que c 'estmagnifique? Thereis so muchhere
that is instantly appealing: the account of enrolment processes, the
'energy-cost'theory of scientific assent, the studyof institutionalization
in terms of obligatory points of passage and funnelled interests, and,
not least, the parallelsLatourpoints out between the objects of science
and the objects of technology. Picking elements out of Latour's book
and intercalatingthem into existing traditionsin the social studies of
science could keep us gainfully occupied for years. This is what may
ultimatelyhappento Latour'swork, but this is clearly not what Latour
wantsto happen.He wantsto enrolus andkeep us in line; he doesn'twant
us to modify the elements out of all recognition, and he doesn't want
us to enrol him. It is only right, therefore, to assess the schema as a
whole, and as Latourhas proffered it to us. What are the goals of the
social studies of science as Latourconceives them?How do these relate
to our existing goals? What resources is he offering us that can help us
achieve our goals?
It is possible that some readers of a nervous disposition may feel
uneasyaboutLatour'sdare-deviltheorizing,squeamishabouthis book's

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over-weeningambitionandthe cosmic scope of his schemata.This would

be wrong: we need many more workers in our field who cast their nets
as widely as Latour;we need to go back to the goals of the 1930s when
workers like Zilsel, Borkenau, Grossmann, Fleck, Bernal, Hessen,
Mannheim,andSorokinall soughtto say thingsaboutscience and society
thatinterestedpeople outwiththe narrowconfines of an academicdiscipline. No, Latour's readers would be better advised to worry about his
modesty, reticence and self-denial, all the more so since the ambition
is apparentwhile the restraintis not. What, according to Latour, will
we be doing if we elect to follow him? His answers may strike some
workers in the field as disappointing. All these resources have been
mobilized and arrayedfor the sake of a 'tiny breathingspace' for 'those
who want to study independentlythe extensions of all these networks'
(257).8 This is not the Ring of the Niebelungen after all; it is just a
shaggy-dog story of epic proportions.
Latour reckons that we need a respite from causal explanations of
science and technology. It makes no difference whether the causal
items are, as it is usually put, 'cognitive', 'natural'or 'social': all such
explanatoryenterprisesare fundamentallymisconceived. Yet it is never
made clear what sort of enterprise we are being invited to put in the
place of explanation. Presumably, it is some version of verstehende
or hermeneutic sociology, though one feels entitled to a much more
systematic confrontationwith this issue than Latouractually provides.
Instead, a matterof such fundamentalimportanceis largely dealt with
by puttingin place a practicallanguage which eschews the word 'why'
in favour of the word 'how'. We 'follow' scientists around;we 'enter'
their laboratories;we 'watch' them at work; we 'understand'the nature
of science and technology. But we don't 'explain' why they make the
choices they do, why the controversies we observe come to be closed
and why they are settled as they are.9
Suchexplanation,it is suggested,is misguidedon two grounds.Latour
first observes thatthe closure of controversiesgeneratesnew controversies. 'We could review all the opinions offered to explain why an open
controversy closes, but we will always stumble on a new controversy
dealing with how and why it closed. We will have to learn to live with
two contradictoryvoices talkingat once...'(13). It is hardto understand
how Latourmakes the move from the undeniableobservationthat there
are differentmembers'accountsof controversyclosureto the conclusion
that the analyst cannot or must not explain such closure. (Gilbert and
Mulkaydo indeed make this move, but Latourhas not noticeablyallied
himself with their programmeof 'discourse analysis'.)10

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543

More fundamentally, Latour argues that we cannot explain why

controversiesclose because the alleged cause is not independentof the
effect to be explained. We cannotgive a realist explanationbecause the
'settlementof a controversyis the cause of Nature'srepresentation';and
we are barredfrom sociological explanationsbecause the closure of a
controversyis also 'the cause of Society's stability' (258). Explanation
of science andtechnologyin termsof 'social factors', andthe programme
dedicatedto showingthe 'social constructionof science andtechnology',
are banned because they are said to rest upon an illegitimate dualism
between science and society.
Analystswho use groupsendowedwith interestsin orderto explainhow an idea spreads,
a theory is accepted, or a machine rejected, are not aware [sic] that the very groups,
the very interests that they use as causes in their explanationsare the consequence
of an artificialextractionandpurificationof a handfulof links from these ideas, theories
or machines. (141)

This is a serious charge, even putting to one side the unfortunate

diagnosisof otheranalysts'statesof 'awareness'.It is the basis of Latour's
attackupon 'relativists' and 'social constructivists'and the warrantfor
the heroic self-denial he imposes upon his own accounts. Are Latour's
criticisms well-aimed and well-informed?Has he adequatelycharacterized the natureand statusof the sociologicalexplanationshe criticizes?12
If he has not, has he imposedunnecessaryconstraintsuponhis own work?
Interests and other 'social factors', Latour says, cannot be used as
causal items because they are the consequences of negotiationand the
effects of the settlementof disputes. He uses his accountof the translation of interests through talk and negotiation as proof of this. Latour
is here evidently equatinginterestswith accounts of interests:as verbal
manoeuvringproceeds and produces its effects on interest-talk,so, it
is assumed, intereststhemselves are transformed.They are thus too soft
to act as causal or explanatoryresources. But, as interest-theoristslike
Barnes have repeatedlyexplained, their 'work refers to interests, not
to agents' accounts of interests, and the two cannot be assumed to be
the same, any more than cream-cakesand accountsof cream-cakescan
be assumed to be the same. With cream-cakes there is a chance of
satisfying hunger - with accounts of cream-cakesthere is not'.13
Interests, Goals and Skills
'Interests'properlypoint to the fundamentallygoal-orientedand instrumental characterof scientific work, and to the contingenciesby which

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Social Studies of Science

particulargoals are constituted. If Latour is to show the illicitness of

interest-explanations,he shouldsystematicallyrid his work of theorizing
aboutthe goal-directednessof technoscience.In practicehe does no such
thing. This book is firmly, and potentially fruitfully, rooted in a view
of technoscientific work as goal-directed, as, indeed, was his earlier
Laboratory Life. It is, however, remarkablethat Latour is now so
reluctantto acknowledge this orientation, and even implicitly to deny
it. In Chapter3 of the presentbook the itemsthatindicatethe instrumental
characterof scientists'and technologists'work are referredto as 'goals'.
Curiously, nothingis said aboutwhat 'goals' are, for Latourintroduces
the term as a way of definingand showing the dependenceof 'interests'.
He notes the etymologicalderivationof 'interests'from 'inter-esse'(that
is, 'whatlie[s] in betweenactorsand theirgoals'), andthus distinguishes
between interests(which he treatsas negotiatedthroughtalk) and goals
(which are generally, if not invariably,spoken of as given) (108-10).14
Latourhas, to all appearances,bannedinterestsby treatingthem as the
same as interest-accounts,while re-introducingthe instrumentalcharacter
of technoscientific work by the back door, in the form of 'goals'.
Latourthereforestill maintainsa fundamentally,if implicitly, instrumentalistorientation.This is not to be criticized. It is the majorresource
thatallows him to makesense of scientists'andengineers'behaviour,and,
for want of a more politic word, to 'explain' what informstheirtrainsof
discursive and manipulativework. They are maximizing animals. In
LaboratoryLife, LatourandWoolgarasked 'WhatMotivatesScientists?'.
They happilyand systematicallyansweredthe questionby invoking the
notionthatscientists,as they followed theircareertrajectories,acquireda
rangeof 'investments'whosevaluetheytriedto protectandenhance.These
investmentsincludedcommitmentsto the credibilityof pastachievements,
socially acquiredexpertise, and familiaritywith traditionsof instrumentation. Such investments were invoked as explanatory responses to
questionslike 'Whatdrivesscientiststo... writepapers,constructobjects,
and occupy different positions? What makes a scientist... choose this
or that method, this or that data... ?'15In other words, 'investments'
were offered as explanationsof scientists' decisions andjudgements in
relation to the possibilities presented to them.
It is a pity that this explicit line was apparentlyabandoned(without
significant comment) by its authors. Even though it seems to be ruled
out by Latour's(and Woolgar's) presentprogrammaticstatements,this
approachhas enormouspotential.It may, indeed, be the most profitable
way forwardfor sociological explanationsof scientific action and of the
closure of scientific controversies. Consider Latour's present account

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545

of technoscientificcontroversyand its settlement. At each stage of the

disbeliever's trajectory, the energy cost of his resistance is raised. In
Latour'sstory it simply becomes harderand harderfor resistanceto be
offered. The resourcesthatare arrayedagainstthe dissenterare various:
they include rhetoric, more rhetoric, new objects, bigger laboratories
andmore expensiveinstruments,more allies, morepowerfulallies, more
disciplinedallies, more cohesive networksof allies, the rhetoricof translation, and, finally, the combinationof these in 'the long heterogeneous
list of resourcesand allies thatscientists [gather]to make dissent impossible' (103). While it becomes more costly andawkwardto resist, Latour
is at pains to assureus thathe has not offered anythinglike a principled
explanation of why controversies close. How can he, since, in his
opinion, all potentialexplanatoryresources are too soft to do the job?
Interestscan be talked away; reality and society are themselves mere
precipitatesof technoscientificcontroversy, the results of furthertalk.
The in-principleproblem of what settles controversy is simply put to
one side in favourof a list of the elements which figure in its resolution.
On the one side we have all the resourcesarrayedto makethe dissenter
submit or to enlist his disciplined participation;on the other we have
Latour'sfundamentalascriptionto the technoscientificactorof maximizing behaviour and the ability to calculate likely consequences of his
behaviour. What informs his decision to resist or submit, to join this
or thatnetwork?If we are to give an explanatoryresponseto this question
we need somethingwhich is not simply the resultof a controversybeing
settled, somethingwhich is not simply to be talkedaway or around.The
laboratoryethnographershould not have far to look for something of
thatsort. Whenhe entersthe laboratorywhatelse shouldhe see but scientists at work?They are, as Latourinsists, producing 'traces', but they
producethem throughroutinesof work. Work is of many kinds: it may
be discursive (rhetorical,representational)and it may be manipulative.
The abilityto accomplishwork of certainkindsis acquiredthroughtrains
of socialization, and, once acquired, constitutes a major 'investment'
to be protected and maximized.
An attack upon the validity of a work-product(a scientific fact or
theory, a line of enquiry,a researchprogramme)is importantlyan attack
upon the legitimacy and value of the work-abilitiesthat make it. The
scientistwhose skills are of no value is literallyunemployed,and he will
fightto defendthe value of his skills as fiercely as any miner, compositor
or machinistfighting the 'rationalizations'of Thatcherism.Moreover,
skills, competences and routines which entrain work-abilities, are not
vulnerableto 'work-talk'or 'skill-talk'.Given a communityof competent

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users, there is no way to talk your way into possession of the relevant
skill. You either have the ability to speak French or you don't; to ride
a bicycle; to build a working TEA-laser; to make a souffle; to culture
Drosophilacells; to performMonteCarlocomputersimulations;to write
a scientific paper in the form acceptable to Nature.'6
There is a peculiarophthalmologicalconditionthat appearspreferentially to afflict the intellectualclasses. They can see the productof work,
but the work itself seems to be invisible. This condition takes its toll
even when the work concernedis intellectualwork and the productsare
ideas. The effect of this opticaldistortioncan be a contrastbetweenpaperwork and proper-work,an assimilationof talk to thought,and an undue
prominence given to that which is, or can be, verbalized. Of course,
discursivecompetencesare skills as muchas manipulativecompetences,
andliteraryskillsare as muchinvolvedas manipulativeskills in the labour
processeswhichmakescientificgoods. But, for all Latour'semphasisupon
'following' scientistsinto theirplaces of work, his book containsremarkably little on the workworldof technoscience.Compared,for example,to
MichaelLynch's recentaccountof scientific 'shop work', Latour'sbook
gives the impression that scientists' day-to-day work consists almost
entirelyof rhetorical,representationaland literarypractices.'7I doubtif
the word 'skill' ever appearsin thisbook, and, even if I noddedandmissed
one or more usages, there is certainlynothinghere thatindicatesserious
interestin the extendedand energy-consumingprocesses of trainingby
andotherskills. Yet the 'inscripwhichscientistsacquiretheirinstrumental
tions' and 'traces'thatconstitutescientificgoods areundeniablyproduced
by routinesof manipulativeandotherworkthatrepresent,as it were, scientists' capital.Calculativetechnoscientificactors, suchas those who figure
in Latour'saccount, are thereforequite able to weigh in the balancethe
coursesof actionofferedto themandthe investmentstheyhaveacquiredin
theirskillsandcompetences.One shouldsay thattheyhave an 'interest'in
those skills andwork-routines,an 'interest'in encouragingor enlistingin
coursesof actionwhich promiseto give scope andvalueto theirskills and
routines.Given a basicallycalculativemodel of the actor(which, indeed,
Latourshareswiththe sociologistshe criticizes),'interests'seemquitehard
and durableenough to figure in a job of explanatorywork.18
Dualism and Discourse
The constraintswhich Latourplaces on himself andhis programmearise
from the same source as his valuablecontributionsto the discipline.Both

Essay Review: Shapin: Following Scientists Around

547

stem from his opposition to conventionally given dualisms that have

bedevilled the social studies of science and allied enterprises.His book
is structuredaround a systematic assault on the legitimacy of a range
of dualisms, includingthose thatjuxtaposethe social and the scientific,
the subjective and the objective, the outside and the inside of science,
the irrationaland the rational,belief and knowledge, the social and the
naturalsciences. In all cases we are instructednot to assumethe validity
of the dualist divides and not to use their componentsas interpretative
resources. Instead, we are to seek an understandingof the processes
throughwhich the analyticallyinvaliddualismsare constituted.Ourdata,
Latoursays, shouldnot be composed of discreteentities called humans,
non-humans,machines, facts, science and society. It should be made
up of strongerand weaker heterogeneousassociations (127, 240). This
is a world in which anythingand anybodycan be an actantor an actor,
where we may elliptically speak of texts but not people as having independent interests, where all differences are differences of scale.
It is the world of the seamless web, a world in which everything is
connected to everything else, in which even the discrete existence of
things and the categorizationof processes cannot be used to interpret
or to explain the actions of those who are said to producethem. There
is muchto be said in favourof monisticimpulsesandthe close inspection
of seams, but there is little to be said from within a seamless web.
Ultimately, those that truly inhabitthe seamless web can say nothing
intelligibleaboutits nature,even, if they are consistent,thatit is seamless
and that it is a web. And, after all, naturalscientistsdo not inhabitsuch
a world. They happilytalk aboutcauses and effects, they seek to explain
how and why one thing brought about anotherthing, they distinguish
between humanbeings and rocks. If we want to understandthe nature
of technoscience, and if we follow scientists aroundto do so, we will
noticewith whatfacilitythey engage, for example,in causalexplanations.
Why shouldwe who seek to understandwhatscientistsdo deny ourselves
the same discursivepracticesthey use? We may well wish to be 'independent' of scientists, but why should we impose constraintson ourselves
thatscientistsdo not observe?In anothercontextBrunoLatourhas said,
'No amountof method can make one text less of a fiction than another
one. In consequence, we are perfectly free to use any style, any data,
any effect, any compositionthatwe (the authorsof a writtentext) deem
adaptedto the audience.'19Quite right.
Latour'swork gives studentsof science andtechnologymajorresources
to extendtheir interpretativeprojects.We shouldbe enormouslygrateful
for these resourcesand we shouldput them to work as soon as possible.

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Social Studies of Science

At the same time he has told us that we must use these resources in the
service of a scholarly enterprisewhich seems radicallyrestrictedcompared to many of those with which we are familiar. Latourhas not yet
given us a convincing argumentthat this new enterpriseis an advance
ratherthan a retreat.

*NOTES
1. For example, John Law (ed.), Power, Action and Belief: A New Sociology of
Knowledge?, Sociological ReviewMonograph,No. 32 (London:Routledge& KeganPaul,
1986), esp. 1-19, 196-280; MichelGallon,Law andArie Rip (eds), MappingtheDynamics
of Science and Technology:Sociology of Science in the Real World(London:Macmillan,
1986). This lattertext is a collection of essays inspiredby Latour'swork. The Glossary of
Latourianterminology(xvi-xvii) shouldbe consultedby readersof Sciencein Action,which
wouldhavebenefitedfromsuchan aid. In a personalcommunicationwrittenafterthis Review
was edited, BrunoLatourhas told me thatthe term 'technoscience'is not his invention. It
derives, instead, from the work of Heidegger.
2. Unfortunately,the proof-readingand the editing do a disservice to the qualityof the
writing.The book is marredby hundredsof errorsgreatand small, from numerousspelling
mistakes to major typesetting and editing blunders that make it difficult to recover the
sense of diagrams (193-94) and entire pages of text (15-16).
3. See, especially, 172-73 of this book and Latour,Les microbes:guerre etpaix, suivi
de irreductions(Paris: A. M. M6tailie, 1984).
4. Apartfromthe well-knownLaboratoryLife: TheSocial Constructionof ScientificFacts
(BeverlyHills, CA: Sage, 1979) [withSteveWoolgar],Latour'swritingsof specialrelevance
in this connectioninclude: 'Give Me a LaboratoryandI Will Raise the World', in KarinD.
Knorr-CetinaandMichaelMulkay(eds), ScienceObserved:Perspectiveson the Social Study
of Science (London:Sage, 1983), 141-70; 'Unscrewingthe Big Leviathan,or How Actors
andAaron
Macrostructure
RealityandHow SociologistsHelpThemDo So', in Knorr-Cetina
Cicourel(eds), Advancesin Social Theoryand Methodology:Towardan Integrationof Micro
and Macro Sociologies (London:Routledge& Kegan Paul, 1981), 227-303 [with Michel
Callon]; 'Visualizationand Cognition: Thinking with Eyes and Hands', Knowledgeand
Society:Studiesin the Sociology of CulturePast and Present, Vol. 6 (1986), 1-40; andLes
microbes, op. cit. note 3.
5. Mary B. Hesse, The Structureof Scientific Inference (London: Macmillan, 1974);
Barry Barnes, T. S. Kuhn and Social Science (London: Macmillan, 1982), Chapter2.
6. This importantnotionpossiblyderivesmost directlyfrom Bourdieu;see, for example,
his interpretationof the symbolic meaning of the domestic threshold:P. Bourdieu, 'The
BerberHouse', in MaryDouglas (ed.), Rulesand Meanings:TheAnthropologyof Everyday
Knowledge (Harmondsworth,Middx: Penguin, 1973), 98-110, on 109.
7. Latouractuallywantsto 'get rid of all categorieslike those of power [and]knowledge'.
It is unclearwhat new terminologyhe prefers,thoughone can speculatethathe is gesturing
towards Foucauldiannotions such as the 'power-knowledge'juncture:Michel Foucault,
ed. Colin Gordon,Power-Knowledge:SelectedInterviewsand OtherWritings,1972-1977
(Brighton, Sussex: Harvester Press, 1980).

Essay Review: Shapin: Following Scientists Around

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8. The thrustof the crucialword 'independently'is not explainedhere nor in a similar

usage earlier (17). Presumably, this refers to Latour's well-known advocacy of the
'outsider's'perspective,thoughthis readingis apparentlyat odds withhis repeatedinsistence
that we 'follow' scientists as 'the best of all guides' (21). An outsider may indeed be
'independent',but he will find himself unable to 'follow' scientists very far. Moreover,
Latourvigorously argues the apparentlyrelativistcase thatjudgementsof the validity and
efficacy of claims can never be 'independent'of particularnetworks (247-50).
9. For elegant argumentsin favour of explanatorysocial science and its compatibility
with verstehen, see John Law and Peter Lodge, Science for Social Scientists (London:
Macmillan, 1984), Chapter 22. For Law's current position see, for example, Law,
'Power/Knowledgeand the Dissolution of the Sociology of Knowledge', in Law (ed.),
op. cit. note 1, 1-19; Michel Callon, John Law and Arie Rip, 'How to Study the Force
of Science', in Callon, Law and Rip (eds), op. cit. note 1, 3-15.
10. See G. Nigel Gilbertand Michael Mulkay, OpeningPandora's Box: A Sociological
Analysisof Scientists'Discourse (Cambridge:CambridgeUniversityPress, 1984). There
is no reference to Gilbert and Mulkay's work in Latour's book.
11. It is unlikelythatrelativistsin the social studiesof science will recognizethemselves
from Latour's caricature(195-97). In his account relativists seek only to establish the
rationalequivalence of alternativeviews; they should be left to 'their professionalduties
as defence lawyers'. In fact, a numberof relativistshave soughtto explain why in specific
settingscertainmoves are not countedrational,legitimateor permissible.See, for example,
H. M. Collins, 'An EmpiricalRelativistProgrammein the Sociology of Scientific Knowledge', in Knorr-Cetina& Mulkay (eds), op. cit. note 4, 85-113. It is one of the major
ironiesof contemporaryscholarshipthatso manypeoplehave takento sayingthatrelativism
and social constructivismare 'fashionable'at just the point when all but a few relativists
have jumped ship.
12. One must, for all that, welcome any pressurethaturges analystsfurtherto refine,
define, justify and reflect upon their explanatoryresources. If there is misunderstanding,
for example,
by no meansall the blameneedbe laid at Latour'sdoor. 'Interest-explanation',
does indeed merit furtherjustification, and, for that reason, one wishes that Latourhad
made the bases of his criticisms more explicit.
13. BarryBarnes, 'On the "Hows" and "Whys" of CulturalChange', Social Studies
of Science, Vol. 11 (1981), 481-98, on 492; see also Barnes, Scientific Knowledgeand
Sociological Theory(London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1974), Chapter4.
14. Thereis the furthercategorywhich Latourcalls 'explicit interests'and which seems
to describe actors' state of knowledgeof their (so-to-speak)real interests(108, 113-14).
But Latour'sdiscussionof goals and interestsis ambiguousthroughout.For example,having
described the flexibility of interests with respect to interpretativetalk, he then says that
while interests 'are elastic', 'there is a point where they break or spring back' (112-13).
And even his 'goals', which he usually invokes as the inelastic purposes of actors, are,
elsewhere, said to be liable to displacementby others' interpretativework or invented
for actors by others (e.g., 108, 114-15).
15. Latour & Woolgar, op. cit. note 4, Chapter5, esp. 189-91.
16. See, for example, H. M. Collins, Changing Order: Replicationand Inductionin
Scientific Practice (London: Sage, 1985), Chapter3.
17. Michael Lynch, Art and Artifactin LaboratoryScience: A Studyof Shop Workand
Shop Talkin a Research Laboratory(London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1985); and see
Latour'scriticalreview: 'Will the Last Personto Leave the Social Studiesof Science Please
Turn on the Tape-Recorder?',Social Studies of Science, Vol. 16 (1986), 541-48.

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18. For researchpointingto the explanatorywork to be done by the categories of skill

and competence,see, for example, PeterGalison, 'Bubble-Chambers
andthe Experimental
Workplace,' in Peter Achinstein and Owen Hannaway(eds), Observation,Experiment,
and Hypothesisin Modem Physical Science (Cambridge,MA: MIT Press, 1985), 309-73;
Galison, How ExperimentsEnd (Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press, 1987);
Andrew Pickering, Constructing Quarks: A Sociological History of Particle Physics
(Edinburgh:Universityof EdinburghPress/Chicago,IL: The Universityof ChicagoPress,
1984); Pickering, 'The Role of Interestsin High-Energy Physics: The Choice between
Charm and Colour', in Karin D. Knorr et al. (eds), The Social Process of Scientific
Investigation. Sociology of the Sciences, VolumeIV, 1980 (Dordrecht:Reidel, 1981),
107-38; Pickering, 'Forms of Life: Science, Contingency and Harry Collins', British
Journalfor the Historyof Science, Vol. 20 (1987), 213-21, on 220-21. I have discussed
empiricalstudiesof 'professionalvested interests'in 'Historyof ScienceandIts Sociological
Reconstructions',History of Science, Vol. 20 (1982), 157-211, esp. 164-69.
19. Latour, op. cit. note 17, 548.

Steven Shapin has been a lecturer in the Science Studies

Unit since 1972. He has published extensively in the history
and sociology of science, and is currently working on a book
assessing the bases of credibility in seventeenth-century
science.
Author's address: Science Studies Unit, University of
Edinburgh, 34 Buccleuch Place, Edinburgh EH8 9JT,
Scotland, UK.