Strong programme

The strong programme in the sociology of scientific knowledge (SSK) was formulated by David Bloor and Barry Barnes at the University of Edinburgh in the 1970s. It demands that explanations of scientific belief be symmetrical — the same kinds of causes should explain both true and false beliefs — and impartial — neither privileging the content of science nor reducing it to error. The programme rejected the traditional distinction between rational accounts of correct science and sociological accounts of failed science, arguing that all knowledge is socially situated.

The strong programme is the intellectual engine of social constructivism applied to science. It treats the scientific method not as a universal algorithm but as a set of locally negotiated practices whose stability depends on institutional enforcement, not on transcendental validity. The programme sparked the science