Institute Life: Bruno Latour, Studying Science, and Faculty Politics

Abstract: This article is a contribution to the history of the social study of science. In the early 1990s, the School of Social Science at the Institute for Advanced Study (IAS) sought to hire scholar Bruno Latour for a permanent faculty position in “science studies.” The resulting controversy, within and beyond the IAS, revealed tensions between scientists, philosophers, historians, and their social scientific counterparts about how science should be studied, as well as shifting disciplinary identities in the field of science studies. The Latour debate preceded the better known “science wars” but bridged earlier debates about the “two cultures” and set the terms for subsequent disagreements. Through a microhistory of Latour’s hiring process, this article also shows how academic hiring relates to discipline formation and shapes institutional politics.