Special Issue of Epistemology and Philosophy of Science The Strong Programme in SSK and its significance for epistemology, philosophy of science and technology and STS

Call for papers Special Issue of Epistemology and Philosophy of Science The Strong Programme in SSK and its significance for epistemology, philosophy of science and technology and STS 2026 marks the 50th anniversary of the Strong Programme in the sociology of scientific knowledge (SP) assuming its start 1976 with “Knowledge and Social Imagery” by David Bloor. It became a prominent 20th century trend-setter in Science Studies. Although having originated in specific socio-political and epistemological context, their ideas keep their relevance ever since: they continue to frame the discussions and define the conceptual language of social and historical studies of science and epistemology and philosophy of science and technology in general. In this issue, we want to present contemporary interpretations and criticism of the SP, evaluations of their relevance for epistemology and philosophy of science and technology, their inspirations for historical and sociological approaches to science. Among the authors of the issue are Finn Collin, Steve Fuller, William Lynch, Anrew Pickering, Stephen Turner. We invite abstracts for further submissions focusing on questions that include, but are not limited to: Historical roots of SP: How to overcome Mannheim and Merton? The interdisciplinary context of SP: psychology, anthropology and linguistics Sociological parallels to the Popper-Kuhn controversy Anti-Latour The new sociological object: technology Symmetry principle and the epistemology of non-scientific knowledge The Strong Programme and epistemic justice Is causality principle incommensurable with objectivity? The Strong Program in the era of "digital epistemology": how algorithms and platform infrastructure become "causes" of scientific beliefs Rational reconstruction and social construction of knowledge Sociological challenges of realism-relativism debates The Strong Programme and the variety of explanations: sociological, historical, psychological, methodological The quest for a naturalistic SSK New empirical fields for verifying the Strong Programme: risk modeling, biomedicine, AI models, digital humanities, and cybersecurity. The Strong Program and a crisis of expertise: does SP explain or contribute to disinformation, fraud science and post-truth? Important Dates and Submission Details The submission deadline for abstracts (250 words): March 15, 2026 (please, send your abstracts with “Special Issue” in the title). Notification of acceptance: March 30, 2026. The submission deadline for manuscripts: August 1, 2026. Abstracts and submissions are welcome in English or Russian. The length of the manuscript should not exceed 8000 words. General guidelines are available on the website All manuscripts will undergo peer review. For further details, please contact the Editor: Prof. Dr. Ilya Kasavin, RAS Institute of Philosophy.