Başak Saraç-Lesavre

BIOGRAPHY

Başak Saraç-Lesavre’s research lies at the interface of Science and Technology Studies, economic sociology, discard studies, and environmental anthropology. She engages with intergenerational responsibilities, valuation practices, energy futures, environmental ethics, and time(s). Her current book project, Nuclear Remains: On Temporalities, Responsibilities and Values examines the ways in which an advanced industrial society has been grappling with nuclear waste and asks what this case tells us about our current (in)capacities to deal with such long-lasting responsibilities. 

Adopting a pragmatist approach, she analyzes political and moral values contained in different forms of valuation practices, economic technologies, infrastructures, and politico-geographic arrangements put in place to link the present to the future. She is currently pursuing research on nuclear and nuclear waste policies (the United States, and France), economic valuation(s) of nature (France, United States), marine pollution (Turkey), and the uses of depths of the Earth as infrastructure (United States, France, Turkey).

Teaching

Sciences Po 

2024-2025. Sociological Inquiries (Undergraduate course in Sociology). 

2024-2025. Qualitative Methods (MSc course in Sociology). 

The University of Manchester 

2023-2024. Designed and taught ‘Intergenerational and Planetary Responsibilities’ (Undergraduate course unit in Social Anthropology).

SELECTED PUBLICATIONS

Saraç-Lesavre, B. 2021. Deep Time: The End of an Engagement, Issues in Science and Technology, 37(3) (Spring 2021).

Saraç-Lesavre, B. 2021. Deep time financing? ‘Generational’ responsibilities and the problem of rendez-vous in the U.S. nuclear waste programme, Journal of Cultural Economy, 14(4).

Saraç-Lesavre, B. 2020. Desire for the worst: Extending nuclear attachments in Southeastern New Mexico, Environment and Planning D: Society and Space, 38(4), 753-771.

Saraç-Lesavre, B. 2019. Stress-testing Europe. Normalizing the Post-Fukushima Crisis, Minerva, 57, 239-260, with Brice Laurent.

Muniesa, F., Doganova, L., Ortiz, H., Pina-Stranger, A., Paterson, F., Bourgoin, A., Ehrenstein, V., Juven, P-A., Pontille, D., Saraç-Lesavre, B., and Yon, G. 2017. Elements for a Social Inquiry into Capitalization. Presse des Mines, Paris.

Qualifications

Nominated for School of Social Sciences’ Research Excellence Award in ‘Best Outstanding Interdisciplinary Research’ category by the Department of Social Anthropology, University of Manchester, 2024.

Nominated for School of Social Sciences’ Research Excellence Award in ‘Best Outstanding Output’ category by the Department of Social Anthropology, University of Manchester, 2022.

EDUCATION 

2015 Ph.D. Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Mines de Paris, Centre de Sociologie de l’Innovation

2012 Visiting Fulbright Fellow, Harvard University, The Department of the History of Science

2009 M.Res. London School of Economics, Innovation and Organisations Research

• Brice Laurent, Basak Saraç-Lesavre, Alexandre Violle,. Formuler l'action publique en termes de tests. Les stress tests européens comme réponse aux crises financières et nucléaires.. Critique Internationale, 2019, 85, pp.63-83. ⟨hal-02367969⟩
• Brice Laurent, Basak Saraç. Stress testing Europe. The contentious harmonization of European nuclear safety. Science and Democracy Network Meeting, Harvard University, Aug 2017, Cambridge, MA, United States. ⟨hal-01667819⟩
• Fabian Muniesa, Liliana Doganova, Horacio Ortiz, Álvaro Pina-Stranger, Florence Paterson, et al.. Capitalization: A Cultural Guide. Presses des Mines, 2017, 9782356714220. ⟨halshs-01426044⟩
• Basak Saraç. Financing a million years? The case of the North-American nuclear waste program. Foreknowledge Assessment. Proving Futures and Governing Uncertainties in Technosciences and Megaprojects, ANDRA, Dec 2016, Paris, France. ⟨hal-01427816⟩
• Basak Saraç-Lesavre. In search of an assessment of the future. The case of the US nuclear waste programme. Markku Lehtonen, PIerre-Benoît Joly, Luis Aparicio. Socioeconomic Evaluation of Megaprojects. Dealing with uncertainties, Routledge, pp.25-43, 2016. ⟨hal-01421930⟩
• Basak Saraç. Trials of explicitness in the formulation of a fee system: The case of the nuclear waste program in the United States. 4th Organizations, Artifacts and Practices (OAP) Workshop : Rules, Regulations and Materiality in Management and Organization Studies, LUISS, Roma - LSE, London - Paris Dauphine, Jun 2014, Rome, Italy. ⟨hal-01112384⟩
• Basak Saraç. Long-term futures in the making: the evaluation of adequacy of funds for a geological repository project in the United States. 11th Annual Conference of European Sociological Association (ESA), Aug 2013, Turin, Italy. ⟨hal-00824575⟩
• Basak Saraç. Uses and Transformation of a Calculative Device in the Revaluations of Nuclear Fuel Cycles in the United States: The Case of Levelized Cost of Electricity". Time, History and Materiality", OAP Workshop,, Jun 2013, LSE - Londres, United Kingdom. ⟨hal-00824555⟩