Societies prosper when science and culture are deliberately fused

Science should be embedded in everyday African culture.[Courtesy]

The assumption that science belongs to laboratories, white coats, and the rarefied pages of academic journals is not accurate. That misconstrued view has persuaded many ordinary people that science is not theirs, and that its discoveries are the concern of distant experts rather than the daily needs of a people.

The same view has made research funding seem like a luxury rather than a foundation. Worse yet, that outlook has created a void that misinformation fills whenever a public health crisis emerges. The truth, however, is simpler. Science is an integral aspect of culture, and a society that fails to embed it within its social fabric risks evading prosperity.

When we speak of a culture of science, we refer to something far broader than test tubes and clinical trials. We mean a society that values evidence over rumours. We mean a society that rewards curiosity rather than punishing it, and that treats knowledge as a public good rather than private indulgence. Such a society does not arise by accident. It must be deliberately cultivated through education, through media, through faith institutions, through the arts, and through the everyday conversations that shape what communities believe to be true.

This is the conviction that informs the upcoming ‘Culture of Science Conference 2026’, which will take place in Nairobi from today to Thursday this week under the theme ‘Shaping Africa's Future through Science’. The conference will bring together policymakers, researchers, innovators, financiers, journalists, artists, and civil society leaders from across the continent.

The conference will seek to negotiate and sign a Culture of Science Action Agenda for 2026 to 2028. The agenda is set to become a binding framework of continental commitments built from public consultation across six life domains that include, learning and knowledge, health and wellbeing, food and environment, innovation and enterprise, culture and media, and governance.

The programme is structured around four pillars that any serious observer will recognise as the load-bearing walls of a scientific society. The first addresses financing, because a continent that spends a fraction of what it should on research and development cannot expect to compete globally. The second tackles policy and regulation, because innovation dies where rules are opaque or absent. The third encompasses research, innovation, and local manufacturing, because African problems demand African solutions produced by African hands. The fourth pillar confronts the most delicate challenge of all - building public trust through the defeat of misinformation and the elevation of science literacy.

Delegates will immerse themselves in sessions ranging from a bankers' round-table on financing the scientific agenda to a media roundtable on combating health misinformation in the digital age. They will hear from traditional medicine practitioners and genomics researchers, from university leaders and industry executives, from faith leaders who command the trust of millions and scientists who struggle to reach the same audiences. That breadth is deliberate because a culture of science cannot be built by scientists alone. It requires the active participation of every institution that shapes public understanding.

The conference will also launch the Culture of Science Network. This is a digital platform designed to sustain the partnerships forged over three days. Honours will be conferred upon individuals whose work has advanced the interface between science and society. And a commissioned performance will open and close the proceedings, because art and science are not enemies but allies in the human struggle to make sense of the world.

The knowledge and tools required to address Africa’s most persistent challenges already exist or are within reach. What remains uncertain is whether the continent's societies will organise themselves to value, fund, and apply that knowledge. The Culture of Science Conference 2026 is an attempt to answer that question with clarity and commitment.

The conference is an invitation to every Kenyan and every African who believes that evidence should guide decision-making, that curiosity should be nurtured, and that the future belongs to those who invest in understanding it.

Ms Muia-Mukhwana, is the chairperson of the steering committee of Coalition for Health Research and Development