Knowledge diplomacy and the future(s) of global cooperation

Hernandez, Ariel Macaspac
External Publications (2021)

in: e-International Relations, 05.04.2021

Volltext/Full text

Scientific and expert knowledge is central to any sustainable future. Because consensual knowledge establishes the parameters within which decisions can be made despite complexity and uncertainty, it assumes a facilitating function. This can be for example well observed on how national strategies to achieve sustainability are developed, legitimized, implemented, and assessed. Policy-makers consult scientific experts to better understand problem issues and to come up with evidence-based solutions that can be jointly accepted by any political ideology and by the constituents. At the same time, the reliance of policy-making to scientific knowledge increases the demand or need to be critical of the emerging scientific authority or technocracy. In the context of transformation to sustainability (T2S) where the outcomes of bargaining and persuasion games represent new lock-ins, the ability or the inability to influence the definition of these lock-ins through equitable access to knowledge is integral to the legitimacy of T2S.
Knowledge diplomacy (and how it leads up to consensual knowledge) is an important driver of creating visions and narratives on sustainable futures. At the same time, the transformation process towards sustainability creates new norms for example in governance and social relations that have implications to how knowledge diplomacy is conducted. Expanding access to education as a strategy to reduce income inequality is more likely to empower a broader citizen participation in consensual knowledge making and thus in policy-making. Building on the author’s work on Sustainable Development Pathways, this article introduces three possible futures scenarios of how knowledge diplomacy can unfold depending on how access to scientific and expert knowledge translates into convening power: convergent cosmopolitan society (melting pot 1), convergent liberal world (melting pot 2), and divergent glocality (salad bowl).

About the author

Hernandez

Further experts

Baumann, Max-Otto

Political Science 

Christ, Simone

Social Anthropology 

Dang, Vy

Political Science 

Dippel, Beatrice

Comparatist 

Droste, Leonie Marie

Political Science 

Flaig, Merlin

Social Science 

Götze, Jacqueline

Political Scientist 

Hackenesch, Christine

Political Science 

Hilbrich, Sören

Economy 

Hornidge, Anna-Katharina

Development and Knowledge Sociology 

Hägele, Ramona

Political Scientist 

Janus, Heiner

Political Science 

Keijzer, Niels

Social Science 

Koch, Svea

Social Science 

Mathis, Okka Lou

Political Scientist 

Reiners, Wulf

Political Science 

Schwachula, Anna

Sociology 

Srigiri, Srinivasa Reddy

Agricultural Economist 

Stamm, Andreas

Geographer 

Vogel, Johanna

International Cultural Economy 

von Haaren, Paula

Development Economics 

Wehrmann, Dorothea

Sociology