What do you think of this interesting statement?  Please let me know!

Here are some comments I have received:

I note that you attribute this to Sandra Harding (1991), but the phrase
also occurs on page 229 in Bruno Latour's "The Pasteurization of French
Society, with Irreductions" (Harvard University Press), which was
published four years before Harding's book (in 1987).

First, it should be noted that the phrase is obviously a play on the
phrase "War is politics by other means", which usually attributed to
Prussian general Karl von Clausewitz. [ What Clausewitz actually wrote
in his book "On War" (1832) was: "War is nothing but a continuation of
politics with the admixture of other means." -- but that is another
story.]

In the context the phrase is used by Latour, it reflects back on
Latour's notion of scientific research as a "Machiavellian" process
where scientists, to win support for "their" theory engange in various
power games to recruit allies and vanquish their foes.

In critical theory, it is generally taken to refer to the fact that
results of scientific inquiry are shaped by the ideological agendas of
powerful elites, rather than the absolute "truth" that is the holy
grail of positivist science.

Personally, I think there is an additonal dimension to the phrase,
resonating with Foucault's notion of the politics of technological
artefacts that he described in "Discipline and Punish" (1977) and
"Power/knowledge" (1980).

            -Gisle Hannemyr, Norway
 

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Revised December 31, 2000