Science is a powerful method of gathering information. But as you have seen throughout this course, information is only one input into the policymaking process. When making a choice between multiple policy options, the facts themselves may not suggest which is better. Rarely can the costs and benefits of a policy be fully separated from moral and cultural judgments. While scientists may strive to be objective, various societal influences on research can also result in scientific evidence and advice that does not equally serve all communities, which impacts how policy is formulated. In this module, we will be exploring these limits on science in policymaking in a democratic society, where technical expertise must also work with popular opinion, as represented by elected officials and public participation.
In conversations about how science interacts with broader social systems, it’s important to realize people may refer to different, though related, concepts when using the word “science”. Science is often defined as a system of creating knowledge, defined by approaches operating under a scientific method. (The scientific method is also complicated to adequately define, but that is outside the scope of this module.) But people may also use “science” to describe the collection of facts and observations produced by this system. Both of these usages are important to consider. In the first definition, science as a practice by humans will always be subject, intentionally or unintentionally, to broader social influences. In the second, it is important to consider what facts and observations have been made, what have not been made, and how groups may influence or operate with the available information.
Ethics and Trust
For people to trust scientific results, they have to trust scientists and how they work. And for the government to support science through the various mechanisms discussed in other modules, the public will need to trust that scientists work in the public interest. Fortunately, scientists are one of the most trusted groups of people in the United States. This makes it especially important to protect that trust by acting ethically. You can consider this module an extension of scientific ethics, which you learned about for research in your discipline, to the responsible conduct of science policy.
Public Input and Impacts
One of the clearest ways public thought affects science is through governmental action. For instance, since 2016, Congress has essentially banned genetic engineering of human embryos for research in the United States due to concerns over the risks of the technology. There are also less extreme versions than prohibiting technologies. Many parts of modern research practice, such as institutional review boards for animal and human studies, the formalization of broader impacts, and conflict of interest disclosures, developed in response to public concern about unethical behavior and the value of publicly supported research.
Stakeholder engagement, reaching out to people and institutions who will be impacted by or otherwise have an interest in policies, is a major input into the policymaking process. This can apply to both science for policy and policy for science. In science for policy, stakeholder needs can determine what are practical policy options and some stakeholders will need to accept justification for costly policies. In policy for science, stakeholders typically want to ensure funding support is responsibly used and may request certain deliverables from specific programs. The Consortium for Science, Policy, & Outcomes has developed a handbook on Usable Science, with advice on evaluating the scientific demands of policymakers and effectively structuring research to meet demand.
There is also a trend of increasing stakeholder engagement with the general public about emerging technologies. This is done to understand societal concerns that scientists should address in their research. Such public engagement was a major part of early government support of nanotechnology and is also seen with forums on biotechnology.
Broader engagement is especially important to consider when science policy impacts marginalized groups, such as people of color, LGBTQ people, and people with disabilities. If you only engage with government officials or influential organizations, you may not understand the concerns of groups who don’t wield formal power, or have limited power, in a community or how your policy impacts them. For instance, pollution tends to be concentrated in areas where people of color live and work (1, 2, 3). This is attributed to environmental racism, the effect of racial discrimination in environmental policymaking.
“Nothing about us without us” is a slogan made popular by disability rights advocates in the late 20th century and is now used in many advocacy movements. It means that groups should be included in decisions that will impact them. In the case of science policy, this can apply to both policymaking and research. In cases of environmental racism, communities of color may be unrepresented /underrepresented in the government institutions that regulate pollution, limiting their power in the legal process. Getting their input may require additional forms of engagement. In research, scientists who aren’t members of a group they are studying may not adequately understand the group’s needs and desires. For instance, Deaf scholars have criticized hearing scientists and engineers for making “sign language gloves” that don’t work with how sign language is used and pose a burden to Deaf users.
Science and Values
Facts alone rarely can make a decision. Consider a simple circumstance of buying a light bulb. You may compare several with an appropriate brightness, but you still have to deal with considerations of energy usage, color temperature, and disposability. For instance, many people disliked early compact fluorescent light bulbs in comparison to older incandescent lights because of the aesthetics of their colors.
This becomes complicated in significant choices that will affect society. Policy evaluation involves weighing the effects of different proposals, and many policies will involve trade-offs between different things a community values. For instance, there are many ways a state or country could work to reduce its carbon emissions, but some proposals could result in undesired effects without careful planning. For instance, a mass increase in the use of electric vehicles could replace gasoline for transport, reducing carbon emissions. But mining the lithium for batteries can be environmentally damaging. A community may find that trade-off acceptable for various reasons. Alternatively, the state/country could decide most residents owning and using personal vehicles doesn’t make sense for the resources it requires and increase more efficient forms of public transit. This could require changing how cities are planned and change people’s lifestyles. What is and isn’t an acceptable or desirable side effect of policies working towards the same goal is going to be based on what the community values.
Scientific results alone do not suggest what should be valued, or even how such values are constructed or prioritized (a value system). But the results are useful for people to understand and can help them see if a policy does align with their values. If a study finds that a policy fails to meet the goals of its supporters, their values may lead them to adjust it to better work or to mitigate unintended consequences. Sited appropriately, the lithium mine may be in an area that doesn’t harm people or it may not impact important wildlife or ecosystems. Appropriate regulation and enforcement can also reduce these impacts. People may also consider what they value in light of new evidence. A public transit education campaign may encourage people who originally prefer driving to use transit more if they realize it helps meet environmental goals they also value.
It’s also important to realize that values that scientists may adopt in their own work are not necessarily universal or can conflict with other values. As discussed in the ethics and public input sections, governments and organizations also impose limits on scientific research to prevent immoral acts from being done for the purpose of science. For instance, while it might speed up genetics research if countries had genetic databases of their citizens that researchers could use, this would go against values of privacy and bodily autonomy that are very important to most people. Public input and engagement are critical to understand what values a society considers most important, and how people want research to reflect it.
In the 2000s and 2010s, various medical groups re-evaluated guidelines for mammographies to screen for breast cancer. Almost every group developed slightly different guidelines in the end. One of the most notable outcomes in this process was that the US Preventive Services Task Force, a government panel whose recommendations determine what services health insurance must cover, no longer recommended routine mammograms for all women in their 40s. The American Cancer Society and American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists also moved away from earlier blanket recommendations for all women to have breast cancer screenings starting at 40. The American College of Radiology has criticized these moves, saying they will cause unnecessary death.
These groups are basing their recommendations on (mostly) the same publicly available data and studies, so the science is very similar. Where these groups differ is in what they prioritize. Notably, economics and cost is not a major factor in these recommendations. In fact, the US Preventive Services Task Force is forbidden from doing financial cost-benefit analyses as part of its recommendations. The American College of Radiology, from similar data, says the assumptions used in the USPSTF models are faulty.
The groups suggesting regular screening should begin later generally argue that screening at 40 has more negative impacts than benefits. Mammography requires radiation, which poses its own risk if done unnecessarily. And the higher false positive diagnoses at younger ages causes stress to the patients and may lead to to unnecessary treatments. ACS thinks women should be screened if they want to starting at 40, but thinks most women could use the time with the doctor more productively. This approach may be considered more utilitarian, by focusing on the net benefits of screening policy. Some groups argue policy should encourage routine screening earlier because it is better for a patient to have as much information as possible. This information empowers the patient to make future decisions. This approach may be considered to place a higher value on individual autonomy.
The Thirty Meter Telescope (TMT) is a proposed optical telescope in the class of “extremely large telescopes”. Scientific goals for TMT include more detailed study of the early universe, large-scale structure of the universe, stellar evolution, and observations of other planetary systems. The proposed site for TMT is the summit of Mauna Kea, a dormant volcano on the island of Hawai’i.
The astronomy community initially chose Mauna Kea for what they viewed to be the best considerations for high-quality observation. A high altitude reduces disturbance by the atmosphere. The weather ensures the telescope can be used most nights.
However, Mauna Kea is a sacred site to Native Hawaiians, especially the summit. (When discussing society in Hawai’i, Native Hawaiian only refers to the indigenous people of the islands). Additionally, there are many important archaeological sites on Mauna Kea. Many Native Hawaiians opposed to TMT are concerned about how it will impact cultural and spiritual practices as well as impacts to the mountain’s ecosystem.
There are two major issues in the TMT debate. One is the potential conflict between bureaucratic procedure and ethical public engagement. TMT leaders have followed established procedures to build the telescope on Mauna Kea. But Native Hawaiians opposed to the project point out the nature of these procedures was historically meant to marginalize them, and say that strict adherence to the letter of the law is not necessarily true engagement. The fact that the University of Hawai’i controls the land reflects the loss of Native Hawaiian sovereignty – Mauna Kea was part of the crown lands of the kingdom of Hawai’i, which some argue were illegally seized by the United States. In any discussion of marginalized groups, it is also vital to realize no community is a monolith. There are also Native Hawaiians who are supportive of TMT on Mauna Kea.
The second issue is the relative prioritization of the science enabled by TMT. Advocates for the telescope argue that TMT on Mauna Kea is the most efficient way to achieve their goals and should have minimal impacts to the physical site. The proposal for TMT also includes outreach and educational programs to Hawaiian students and the broader public. But opponents say that the scientific results do not inherently outweigh the disruption to Native Hawaiian culture. And they argue the existence of a similar alternate site that does not have such cultural significance means scientific progress and respect to indigenous religion and rights should not be weighed against each other, even if the alternate La Palma site requires modifications to the original design proposal.
Limits of Scientific Knowledge
Acknowledgments and Further Reading
- The Honest Broker, by Roger Pielke Jr., discusses four archetypes of scientific input into policy and politics and discusses the importance of values and uncertainty in science policy
- The discussion here on the Thirty Meter Telescope is influenced by the work of Chanda Prescod-Weinstein and her Decolonising Science Reading List, and sources were selected from it
- Related to, but distinct from, “usable science” is the concept of “policy readiness of ideas”. This is a policy analogue to “technology readiness levels“.