Radwaste at sea: a new era of polarization or a new basis for consensus?
In: Ocean development and international law: the journal of marine affairs, Band 19, Heft 5, S. 345-366
ISSN: 0090-8320, 0883-4873
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In: Ocean development and international law: the journal of marine affairs, Band 19, Heft 5, S. 345-366
ISSN: 0090-8320, 0883-4873
In: Ocean development & international law, Band 19, Heft 5, S. 345-366
ISSN: 1521-0642
In: Review of policy research, Band 6, Heft 2, S. 389-398
ISSN: 1541-1338
Controversy among scientists over appropriate use of the ocean for waste disposal impedes U.S. policy in this area. The problem arises in part because scientific uncertainty over the fate and effects of wastes released into the ocean requires a large element of judgment, and hence value, when the uncertain science is applied to policy. Scientists often supply that judgment and so impose their values, though seldom explicitly, on policy. Further, science often determines policy because many perceive it as an objective basis for decisionmaking and so less subject to the debate that arises from weighing public preferences in policymaking. Thus, scientists' values rather than the public's come to set policy. The resulting policy may elevate one expert's values over another's. Then as values and so interpretation of science shift, policy changes. Or, as in the case now with arguments over the ocean's ability to assimilate many anthropogenic wastes, conflicting science, really conflicting values, results in an agreement and policy inertia. These problems are partially circumvented when scientists make the nonscientific factors behind their reasoning clear. These factors may then be evaluated by the public along with the supporting scientific evidence. Thus, weighing the welfare of society rather than resolving conflicts among scientists becomes the focus of policy.
In: Policy studies review: PSR, Band 6, Heft 2, S. 389
ISSN: 0278-4416
In: Lecture Notes on Coastal and Estuarine Studies 20