ABSTRACT
The analogy to religious and ethnic struggles, of course, can only take us so far. Unlike the combatants in Bosnia, the Punjab, and South Central Los Angeles, the partisans of science, law, and politics generally recognize that their professional cultures are neither monolithic nor wholly self-defining, and that their social interdependence runs deep. This chapter describes two notorious disputes, Bendectin and Agent Orange, which exemplify some of the patterns that the author shall discuss. It extends the theme of cultural conflict beyond the litigation context by sequentially analyzing and comparing science, law, and politics along three dimensions: their central values; their distinctive incentive structures and decision techniques; and their characteristic biases, especially their orientations toward the tension between professional and populist values. The chapter also discusses how one should approach the multi-culturalism problem in public policymaking, especially where science issues are involved.
