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This article presents a brief response to the replies by Vicky Singleton and Brian Wynne. The author will base what he has to say on the original papers and his response to them, take account of the replies by Singleton and Wynne, and summarizes his main conclusions from the exchange. The two replies to the author's original response to the Special Issue of Social Studies of Science on "The Politics of SSK" carry on the debate in rather different ways. Hence, the author discusses them separately in this paper.

The topic of neutrality versus commitment within the sociology of scientific knowledge was the direct cause of the Special Issue of the journal "Social Studies of Science." The set of papers as a whole embraces many aspects of the theme under discussion. In this brief Response, the author will focus on two central questions. The first is whether science and technology studies (STS) accounts should stick to descriptive analyses of the politics of science and technology, or whether they should also engage in normative criticisms, assessments or recommendations. It is concluded that a certain type of STS normativity is legitimate, and may constitute a specific contribution to political debates on science and technology. The second question concerns the realism-relativism issue. It is argued that this issue continues to integrate descriptively adequate and normatively engaged accounts of science and technology.