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SPARK Hosts International Workshop on Knowledge and Parliaments



On 14-15 October, SPARK welcomed 20 researchers from across Europe and hosted a workshop to address the theme of the relationship between knowledge and parliaments.


The workshop, which coincided with the first phase of the five-year SPARK project, was an opportunity to share cutting edge research on relevant themes and allow participants to expand and/or deepen their research networks through informal discussion. Paper presentations covered diverse themes, methodological approaches, and country cases spanning three continents.


After a welcome and an overview of SPARK, participants presented their latest cutting edge research that explored how parliaments relate to knowledge use in a range of ways (jncluding the emerging research findings from SPARK). A number of key themes emerged, including:


  • An increase in the availability of ‘expert’ information in parliaments, sometimes contrasted with a questioning of expertise or dismissal of certain kinds of academic/expert knowledge.

  • The existence of different techniques to quantitatively track certain types of knowledge reference in formal parliamentary spaces.

  • The analytical possibilities of distinct comparative frameworks for examining knowledge-use and institutions in parliaments, as well as categorising different types of ‘knowledge’, ‘evidence’ and ‘expert’.

  • The need to chart non-linear relationships between knowledge production and knowledge use in parliaments.

  • The importance of informal practices and spaces shaping knowledge transmission and use in parliaments.

  • The value of studying institutional ‘silence’ and the production of ignorance as well as knowledge in parliamentary processes and debates.

  • The range of factors potentially shaping knowledge use: time availability, knowledge availability, parliamentary resourcing, institutional cultures, type of parliamentary function, type and powers of committee, trust, ideological stances, party type, political polarisation, issue salience, and more.

  • The promise of mixed-methods designs, inter-disciplinary approaches, and new or less-studied cases, in research on knowledge and parliaments.


It is hoped that these and other themes will likely form part of ongoing reflections and discussions on these topics.


The organisers thank all those who participated, and look forward to continuing conversations with both those present and any others whose work and interests connect with the topics of knowledge, parliaments and their relationship with democratic governance.


For more information or to contact the SPARK team, please visit the SPARK website and contact form here.


Image credit: Emilia Aiello

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