This article, in order to expound the perspective of social technology as experimenting with alternative forms of economic exchanges and political relations, is divided into two sections. The first approaches the modern problematic connected with the relation between scientific knowledge and social organization, highlighting, on the one hand, critical perspectives that investigate the social and historical factors that have shaped dominant cognitive paradigms and, on the other hand, the scientific and technological policies that propose and promote the redefinition of scientific activity in terms of economic performance. In the light of this scenario, the second section situates the creation of the Network for Social Technology in Brazil in order to discuss, with Renato Dagnino's definition of social technology as the starting point, some difficulties and certain limits of the cognitive and political possibilities of the conception and practice of a "social technology". The exposition emphasizes the social nature of the obstacles that confront these alternative possibilities.
Economic policy; Science and technology policy; Academic policy; Social technology; Alternative development