Franz, Seifert | Austria

Studied physical and cultural Anthropology in University Vienna.

Graduation 1993 with an empirical research-project in intercultural behavioural science.
Postgraduate Training in Political Science at the Institute of Advanced Studies, Vienna.

Since 1997 Participation in the research projects: "Biotechnology and the European Public" and "Safety Regulation of Transgenic Crops: Completing the Internal Market?" Both funded by the European Commission.

1997 - April 2000 Research Fellow in the Institute of Technology Assessment, Austrian Academy of Science.
Since April 2000 independent social researcher.

Fellow at the Institute for Advanced Studies on Science, Technology and Society, from February to August 2002.

Research in public perception, media discourse and policy-analysis in the field of genetic engineering, biology and racism in public discourse, democratic development in South East Asia.

Project at IAS-STS:  Biotechnolgy - The Public - Democracy

The Austrian controversy on biotechnology in the international context. The purpose of my stay in Graz is to shorten down and refine a first version of a broad reconstruction of the international and Austrian conflict on biotechnology. The reconstruction is guided by a normative framework organised around the terms public and democracy and pursues a discourse analytical approach. It connects various phenomena as diverse as risk controversy in the sphere of regulatory science, broad public mobilisations against biotechnology and economic as well as political globalisation. Adopting an "ironic" perspective under democratic premises it aims at rendering a normative evaluation of past events possible as well as identifying current challenges to democracy.

Selected Publications

2000 Die Österreichische Biotechnologiepolitik im EU-Mehrebenensystem: Zur Effektivität öffentlichen Widerstandes im supranationalen Gefüge. in: Barben, D., Abels, G., (Hg.) Biotechnologie und Globalisierung. Politische Gestaltungsmöglichkeiten transnationaler Technologieentwicklung. Sigma: berlin, 313-332.

2000 Rezension: Governing Molecules. The Discursive Politics of Genetic Engineering in Europe and the United States. Herbert Gottweis; in: Österreichische Zeitschrift für Politikwissenschaft 2000/1,114-116.

2001 "Österreich im internationalen Konflikt um die Gentechnik: Konfliktformen und Konsenssuche in Wissenschaft und Öffentlichkeit. Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der Biologie." Dissertation Univ. Salzburg.

Together with H. Torgersen: 2000 Precautionary Blockage of Agricultural Biotechnology, Journal of Risk Research 3, 3, 209-217

Together with W. Wagner: 1998 Medianeaktivität zur Gentechnologie in Österreich. Eine Längsschnittsanalyse. in: SWS Rundschau38, 2, 249-264.

Together with W. Wagner, H. Torgersen, P. Grabner und S. Lehner: 1998 "Austria" in: John Durant, Martin Bauer, George Gaskell (Eds.) Biotechnology and the European Public. Science Museum Press, 15 -28.

Together with H. Torgersen, C. Egger, P. Grabner, N. Kronberger, P. Weger, W. Wagner:
2001 Austria: "Narrowing the Gap to Europe" in: Gaskell, G., Bauer, M. (eds.), Biotechnology 1996-2000: The years of controversy, Science Museum Press, 131-144.