The Power of Experts: How does the justice system handle the shifting domain of expertise in the courtroom?

Ahead of the closing session for Law on Trial 2014, Renata Salecl reflects on the role and authority of expertise in the justice system. She argues which experts we rely on very much depends on today’s media and the comforting fantasies they offer supporting the efficacy of science and of its empirical neutrality. But error and fraud also play a significant role and it cannot be ignored that such technologies are frequently compromised by their implementation, by subjective motives driving their design and application, and by the very strength of the expectations and fantasies they attract.