London School of Economics & Political Science - Strategic Governance of Science and Technology
Pathways to Security
The world is in the midst of a profound transition in the way that we understand and practice
security with a range of competing security discourses- for example, counter-terror, geo-politics or
human security. The Strategic Governance of Science and Technology Pathways to Security aims to
assist the design and implementation of effective government security policy by improving our
understanding of how the pathways and trajectories taken by science and technology shape, and are
shaped by, these changing discourses on security. Investigating the ‘direction’ as well as the ‘rate’ of
technical change, the interdisciplinary research sees innovation in non-linear terms, recognising
diverse counterfactual options that are neglected as socio-technical systems become ‘locked-in’ to
possibly undesirable configurations. The programme aims to understand which discursive pathways
of security are being realised in technological innovation and infrastructure and to identify options
to diversify and improve public policy, technology and practices. This will be done through a series
of case studies about the way in which different technological pathways relate to different security
discourses. These include Neuroscience, Advanced Robotics, Social Media, Geoengineering,
Bioinformatics, and IED technologies. Methodologically, the research incorporates ESRC-STEPS
‘pathways’ approaches, scientometric mapping, and ‘Q-method’ techniques, with inbuilt outreach
and dissemination strategies.