American Foundations and Large Research: Construction and Transfer of Knowledge

Descrizione

This book originates from a workshop held in
Bogliasco (Genova), whitin the framework of an international researh network on
the “Role of American Foundation in Europe (1920’s-1990’s)”. It deals with a
rather complex subject, the transfer of scientific knowledge and its changing
patterns in the long-period, from the Twenties until the Seventies of the last
century. It also deals with theoretical and organisational changes in specific
disciplinary fields, with a particular focus on the effects produced by
development of large-scale research in shaping scientific and institutional
frameworks, during specific historical conjunctures. The analysis of the role of
the American Foundations in this process has been considered as a multiple
revealer: not only vis-a’-vis the specific question of the transfer of knowledge
from one context to another, but also with respect to the changing patterns in
the organisation of disciplinary fields, in the development of academic
communities as well as in strenghening or, on the contrary, in limiting
large-scale scientific co-operation. Finally, the analysis of the role of
American Foundations has been considered as a detector of the different
behaviour of individual and institutional actors, with respect to the context in
which scientific programs are developed: local, national, international and
“global”. The ideal readers of this book are the historians of science and
scientific institutions, particullary in the 20th century as well as the
historians of philanthropy.