Un progetto “in divenire”. La politica europea della ricerca e dell’innovazione tra integrazione e differenziazione

This article investigates the emergence and consolidation of a European, transnational, field of science and innovation in Bourdieu’s sense of the concept. It proposes an approach to an EU research and development policy field based on a combination between sociology of knowledge and political sociology, aimed at supporting the hypothesis of a European integration process at the crossroad between institutional and ideational instances of different nature. By considering the coordination of the scientific production and circulation as transnational stakes, the article sheds light on the complex and dynamic configuration of institutional actors, ideational frames and politically effective resources the arose over a period stretching over more than six decades. In that respect, it contends that science comes into play both as an object of the EU decisions as well as an “ally” of the EU institutions in that it provides them with a policy-relevant knowledge (meta-capital) defined as “informational capital”.