Hydrobiological monitoring: a case of interdependence between public and private expertise

Abstract

Outsourcing and controlling through "quality" procedures are two particular modalities of new public management (Bezes, 2005). Several sociologists have pointed to the paradox of these reforms which refocus the State on steering functions but reduce its capacity for expertise (see for example Barone et al., 2016). In line with these works, we study here the contradictions encountered with the reform of the public chemistry and hydrobiology laboratories in charge of the water monitoring. In the first part, we retrace the history of these reforms and the choices made by the public actors involved to guarantee the quality of the data. Then we explain the difficulties encountered by ambiguities about what makes the hydrobiological monitoring data valuable. Finally, we discuss the conditions necessary to generate confidence in a market and the limits that the current system faces.