Dreams of Global Science

The idea of global science is aspirational. Access to scientific resources and prestige is unevenly distributed, shaped by inequalities along the lines of nationality and other social categories. Yet this ideal still has meaning—perhaps nowhere more than in China, where the desire to become a leader in global science is held with great conviction by researchers, universities, and the state. Larry Au examines how Chinese scientists aspire toward global science as they engage in international collaborations to create shared goals and norms around emerging biomedical technologies. He traces how the concept of precision medicine has taken on a new life in traveling from the United States to China, interacting with national politics and conceptions of health and illness from traditional Chinese medicine. Through the case of precision medicine, Au shows how global and national forms of science cooperate, compete, and come into conflict with one another, producing what he calls hybrid science. In China, hybrid science combines dreams of future scientific ascendancy with nostalgia for the past, such as its interest in modernizing traditional medicine. Yet hybridization can result in illegibility and a lack of recognition, devaluing the work, labor, and ideas of Chinese scientists and exacerbating their exclusion from global science. Offering new insights into transnational scientific networks and biomedical innovation, this book demonstrates how global science becomes entangled with national forms—and changes in the process.