The Cult of the Expert

When a population trusts laboratory coats more than its own elected parliament, police, and government, high-minded intellectuals tend to applaud. In Switzerland, the annual ETH Zurich security study reveals that science has dethroned the police at the top of the public trust hierarchy. Science historian Naomi Oreskes from Harvard University promptly praised the Swiss public for prizing high-quality information more than their American counterparts. Yet this glowing self-congratulation masks a deeper, more uncomfortable reality: a retreat into technocratic naivety.

Placing ultimate faith in research institutes is less an act of civic enlightenment than a symptom of a society seeking easy answers. As political scientist Eri Bertsou from the University of St. Gallen observes, citizens searching for orientation in an uncertain world simply migrate their trust when faith in traditional politics wanes. Where post-Cold War skepticism was once a left-wing trait in Eastern Europe, modern skepticism has migrated heavily to the right across Western Europe and the United States—a pattern confirmed by the ETH study. More alarming still, global survey data across 68 countries indicates a widespread desire for scientists to assume a far stronger role in active policymaking.

The danger of this technocratic delusion became obvious during the pandemic, when political leaders famously hid behind slogans demanding that the public follow the science. As Bertsou points out, treating scientific consensus as a singular, static truth blurred the crucial boundary between expert advice and political accountability. When policy shifts were inevitably required as data evolved, scientific institutions were scapegoated for decisions that belonged squarely in the hands of elected ministers.

Equally naive is the academic world's view of global research in an era where authoritarian regimes weaponize knowledge. Ralph Weber, a China researcher at the University of Basel, highlights how autocratic states press scientific research into the service of party rule, bypassing open debate entirely. While Western universities preach borderless collaboration, joint research in technical fields like hydraulics easily risks supporting military applications in countries where civil and military domains are fused.

Meanwhile, digital networks allow raw opinion to pass as verified knowledge, putting pressure on academic institutions to justify their societal value. Rather than seeking to govern or act as moral oracles, universities ought to clarify how true research works—distinguishing between objective findings and value-laden interpretations. Democratic governance requires political choices and public debate, neither of which can be safely outsourced to a research laboratory.

Written by Freya Stensrud freya.stensrud@alpineweekly.com