Program on Science, Technology and Society at Harvard

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A New Roadmap for Science and Society

Alondra Nelson

Deputy Director for Science and Society, White House Office of Science and Technology Policy

November 3, 2021, 5pm-7pm ET
Virtual

Abstract

Lecture Description: The lecture will present White House Office of Science and Technology Policy efforts to create a new roadmap for science and society that reflects democratic values, advances equity, and upholds scientific integrity. Deputy Director Alondra Nelson will broach a wide range of topics, including equitable data, upholding rights in an increasingly automated society, the White House Scientific Integrity Task Force, and more. A crosscutting theme of the lecture is how science and technology policymakers in the Biden-Harris Administration are working to restore trust in government, advance equity at scale, and fortify democratic values.

Panel

Craig Calhoun

University Professor of Social Sciences, School of Sustainability, College of Global Futures, Arizona State University

Francesca Dominici

Clarence James Gamble Professor of Biostatistics, Population and Data Science, T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Harvard University

Jennifer Hochschild

H.L. Jayne Professor of Government, Professor of African and African American Studies, and Harvard College Professor

Moderated by

Sheila Jasanoff

Pforzheimer Professor of Science and Technology Studies, Harvard Kennedy School

About the speaker

Alondra Nelson serves as the inaugural Deputy Director for Science and Society in the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. In this role, she brings social science expertise, including attention to issues of social inequality, explicitly into the work of Federal science and technology strategy and policy. Dr. Nelson is also Harold F. Linder Chair and Professor at the Institute for Advanced Study. She was president of the Social Science Research Council from 2017-2021. Previously, she was professor of sociology at Columbia University, where she also served as the inaugural Dean of Social Science. Dr. Nelson began her academic career on the faculty of Yale University. Her major research contributions include Technicolor: Race, Technology, and Everyday Life (with Thuy Linh N. Tu); Genetics and the Unsettled Past (with Keith Wailoo and Catherine Lee); Body and Soul: The Black Panther Party and the Fight Against Medical Discrimination; and The Social Life of DNA. She is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the American Academy of Political and Social Science, the American Philosophical Society, and the National Academy of Medicine.  

Co-sponsored by the Harvard University Center for the Environment, the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, and the Harvard Data Science Initiative.