Public Engagement in Agricultural Biotechnology: Comparative Analysis of Actors, Narratives and Epistemologies Enacted in a Deliberative Workshop on Gene Editing in Agriculture and Food.

Science and Technology Studies scholars have promoted public engagement in science and technology through venues such as deliberative workshops in to order to engage key actors in providing a participatory appraisal of the use of and governance approaches for emerging technologies. This paper focuses on a comparative narrative analysis of deliberative workshops in the US, Netherlands, and New Zealand, countries with distinctive cultural and regulatory contexts, that we convened to engage publics around use and governance of gene editing in agriculture and food. I explore what values, assumptions and concepts are framing the debate around gene editing in these countries, and how they are shaped by difference. Who decides to participate in public engagement venues, and how does that differ across contexts. I take a narrative approach to analyze the deliberative workshop text to ask: what are participants’ substantive concerns when they are discussing gene editing in food and agriculture; how are these concerns produced in interactive discussion; and what master narratives (or stories) do they draw on in their discussions? This case study reveals challenges with engaging ‘publics’ in complex and contentious science and technology issues.