The dialectic of transnational integration and national disintegration as major challenge of the aggregation of knowledge by European Expert Groups

Jean Philippe Décieux

From a phenomenological perspective on modern systems of knowledge production a transformation towards a hybrid knowledge production has taken place. Categories like locality or embeddedness have been overcome and rise of arenas of cross-broader-cooperation can be observed. The political sector is an important example where a rise of decision-making contexts with supra national relevance can be detected. As consequence a transformation of the political advisory-system towards the genesis of multinational advisory organisations on supranational level can be observed. This means that decision-making knowledge is developed and standardized on supranational level and supposed to be applied top-down on local level. Theoretically such a cooperative form of knowledge co-production of application-driven knowledge by a heterogeneous set of stakeholders aims to produce a context specific solution for specific problems of application (“socially robust knowledge”) in order to provide evidence-based policy-making. But in fact such a processes of unification of knowledge on supranational level often reduces national policy autonomy and is associated with the risk of limited compliance to the specific local needs. Thus the universal transnational knowledge is systematically contested by a variety of particularistic relevancies as is lacks in socially robustness for the application on national decision-making level (“dialectic of transnational integration and disintegration “.
This paper analyses how national policy systems are responding to global integration initiatives. By using an in-depth-case-study, I focus especially on individual actors and their responses in the light of a multiplicity of institutional relevancies and the effective social robustness of the aggregated knowledge on national level.

Suggested Citation

Décieux, J. P. (2017). The dialectic of transnational integration and national disintegration as major challenge of the aggregation of knowledge by European Expert Groups. TransWissen. Transnationalisation and Knowledge: The Ubiquity of Translation and the Crisis it Faces, Trier.

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