Description
Book SynopsisIn The Will to Predict, Egle Rindzeviciute demonstrates how the logic of scientific expertise cannot be properly understood without knowing the conceptual and institutional history of scientific prediction. She notes that predictions of future population, economic growth, environmental change, and scientific and technological innovation have shaped much of twentieth and twenty-first-century politics and social life, as well as government policies. Today, such predictions are more necessary than ever as the world undergoes dramatic environmental, political, and technological change. But, she asks, what does it mean to predict scientifically? What are the limits of scientific prediction and what are its effects on governance, institutions, and society?
Her intellectual and political history of scientific prediction takes as its example twentieth-century USSR. By outlining the role of prediction in a range of governmental contexts, from economic and s
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This book reviews the intellectual and political history of scientific prediction. Rindzeviit (criminology and sociology, Kingston Univ., London) is concerned with prediction as used to inform governance, including economic forecasting. The author focuses mainly on Soviet Russia (the former USSR) with its specialized emphasis on prediction and planning.
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