From Cultural Studies to Cultural Science?

Well, it's not my project, so I'll leave it to the group behind Cultural Science to make the full argument in favour of the new discipline - but from what I've seen so far (and there's a selection of some very in-depth papers already published on the site) there are a few very convincing points to be made here. (As always with these things, too, it's important not to get hung up about the terms used, but to see whether the substance is there.)

I think they're right in saying that cultural studies often lacks the ultimate scientific rigour that makes it immediately useful for wider societal debates (and especially also as an input for policy-making): it's a discipline that's very adept at tracing and interpreting sociocultural developments, but it's doing so often with implicit and idiosyncratic methodologies - its findings aren't necessarily testable and repeatable, which makes them easily dismissable by those with a vested interest in ignoring the results of cultural studies research. (As a case in point, Australia has just lived through 11 years of casual hostility and ignorance towards cultural studies research, for example.)

That's not to say that there isn't serious research being undertaken in cultural studies, of course, and I agree with you that many of us working in this field are fed up with reductionist debates of 'science vs. humanities'. Which is precisely what I find interesting about cultural science: it's not simply an attempt to give cultural studies a scientific veneer to increase its respectability, but genuinely aims to develop a truly interdisciplinary, even promiscuous combination of the best that cultural studies, evolutionary economics, and other disciplines have to offer. Whether the end result is called a science, an interdisciplinary field, or whatever else is not a question I'm particularly invested in (but John, Stuart, and the others behind it might feel differently).

P.S.: I thought I should also note that a substantial discussion about the pros and cons of cultural science would be better placed on the CS blog, rather than here - I'm only highlighting what's going on there, but can't claim to have entirely wrapped my head around it all yet...