Scaling Participation: A Genealogical, Relational, and Reparative Analysis of Standardisation in Marine Citizen Science: Rethinking Quality and the Governmental Paradox Between Past, Present, and Future
Translated title
Scaling Participation: A Genealogical, Relational, and Reparative Analysis of Standardisation in Marine Citizen Science
Authors
Term
4. term
Education
Publication year
2026
Submitted on
2026-01-09
Pages
80
Abstract
This thesis examines how expert communities in marine citizen science construct and navigates a governmental paradox: the standards and validation practices that make citizen-generated observations usable for science and policy can also restrict what counts as legitimate knowledge and participation. Using the European OBAMA-NEXT initiative as a primary case, the thesis approaches standardisation as a socio-technical process rather than a purely technical one, tracing how protocols, categories, and platform design shape whose observations can circulate and under what conditions. The analysis combines a genealogical sensibility with relational thinking about scale-making and a reparative orientation toward design. It draws on interviews with experts, thematic workshops, archival material, and participant observation to examine the discourses and decisions through which citizen’s participation is configured in expert forums. The thesis follows how inclusion is built into professional infrastructures that distribute authority and labour while presenting themselves as neutral measures of data quality. The findings show that current arrangements often position citizens primarily as data providers rather than knowledge producers, even as democratisation rhetorics frame citizen science as epistemically and politically transformative. Comparability is achieved through practical ‘cuts’ that stabilise categories and reduce variability, enabling data to travel across scales while narrowing epistemic possibilities. To move beyond critique, the thesis proposes a Trinary System that replaces ladder-like participation models with three equally legitimate purposes. The proposal offers a way to widen what can count as meaningful participation without discarding the infrastructural need for comparability in marine environmental monitoring. The thesis concludes that the paradox is not a flaw to be solved once and for all, but a constitutive tension that can be handled more transparently and more inclusively through careful redesign of standards.
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