Israel Rodríguez Giralt

I’m currently Full Research Professor at the IN3 – Open University of Catalonia (UOC). My field of research is the so-called STS (Science and Technology Studies) and the study of new forms of technical democracy (social experimentation, public debate and mobilization). I’m particularly interested in understanding the role of technoscience in new health and social care activism and in public engagement and participation in disaster situations.

I hold a degree in Psychology from the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (with honours).  I received my PhD from Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (with honours) for the PhD thesis entitled: “The symmetrical turn in the study of collective action: the ecological controversy of Doñana”. 

From 2002-2016 I have worked as Associate Professor in the Department of Psychology and Educational Sciences at UOC. Since 2016 I’m coordinating CareNet Research Group.

I have been visiting researcher at Loughborough University (2002), Centre for the Study of Invention and Social Process, Goldsmiths College, London (2009; 2010-2012) and Instituto de Sociología, Pontificia, Universidad Católica de Chile (2015). 

I am member of the European Association for the Study of Science and Technology (EASST) & of the Society for Social Studies of Science (4S). As member of the Local Committee, I recently co-organised the 2016 EASST/4S Joint Conference in Barcelona.

In 2014, I received the Amsterdamska award from the European Association for the Study of Science and Technology for the book: “Disasters and Politics: Materials, Experiments and Preparedness” (Wiley/Blackwell, 2014), co-edited with Manuel Tironi and Michael Guggenheim. In 2018, I received the David Edge Prize from the Society for the Social Studies of Science (4S) for the article “Healing, Knowing, Enduring: Care and Politics in Damaged Worlds” published in The Sociological Review in 2017.