Which techniques and skills can be used to overcome the obstacle of dialogue between scientists in different disciplines? Drawing on Gorman's book on trading zones and Collins and Evans' thinking on interactional expertise, this article analyses the work by individuals to manage five interdisciplinary panels commissioned by French ministries. It observes that these panel managers have different techniques to open, construct and close the debate. These techniques, which condition the submission of the final report, call for skills that managers acquire over the course of their experiences in trading zones. Implications of findings for the formation and management of interdisciplinary expert groups and for the concept of interactional expertise are discussed.

Les cadres institutionnels de l’expertise renvoient aux principes théoriques et aux modalités pratiques de formes d’expertise particulières. Peu de chercheurs se sont intéressés à leur formation tout comme au travail des entrepreneurs pour promouvoir ces formes. À travers le cas du développement de l’Expertise collective (une méthode de revue systématique de la littérature) par le directeur de l’INSERM et son entourage entre 1982 et 1994 en France, cet article démontre que ces cadres sont le produit d’un processus long, incrémental et contingent. Ce processus repose sur trois activités des entrepreneurs de formes d’expertise : la mise en pratique de leurs représentations par expérimentation (ou essai-erreur) ; l’examen des dispositifs existants ; la promotion et la négociation de ce cadre, notamment auprès des commanditaires potentiels.

After two decades of research on throughput legitimacy, making sense of the stock of accumulated knowledge remains a challenge. How can relevant publications on throughput legitimacy be collected and analysed? How can the level of throughput legitimacy be measured? Which policy activities contribute to the production of throughput legitimacy? To answer these questions, we designed and implemented an original systematic literature review. We find that the measurement of the level of throughput legitimacy introduces a number of problems that call for the systematic and rigorous use of a more complete set of precise, specific indicators to advance the theory of throughput legitimacy. A number of participatory decision-making activities contribute to the production of throughput legitimacy. Engaging in these activities is not without risk, as variations in throughput legitimacy affect input and output legitimacy. To prevent vicious circles, lessons can be drawn from the literature on collaborative governance and decision-makers’ strategies to support effective collaboration between stakeholders.

Abstract Scholars have long investigated connections between types of knowledge use and types of policy subsystem. Yet, most of them focus on the learning function of expert information. The legitimizing function of knowledge—when expertise serves as a substitute for decision (Boswell in J Eur Public Policy 15(4):471–488, 2008)—has attracted less attention. An empirically validated explanation of this function is still missing. This article tests existing hypotheses regarding which features of the subsystem are conducive to the legitimizing function. The demonstration rests upon a case study: France’s Ministry of Agriculture’s commissioning of INRA to carry out a systematic literature review on pain in farm animals. Two types of factors are involved in the legitimizing function of knowledge: environmental mechanisms (an adversarial policy subsystem, concentration of policy authority) and relational mechanisms (coalitions displaying epistemic uncertainty and exerting pressures on the source of policy authority, a policy broker mitigating the conflict between the two coalitions).