climate change, science and policy - … · april 05, 2011 the climate change issue emissions...

Climate change, science and policy

Graeme I Pearman

Prof. Fellow, Melbourne University

April 05, 2011

The climate change issue

Emissions

Choice of technology

Energy demand

Efficiency

Human health

Climate change

• Vested interests

• Natural resources• Ignorance• Market failure

GDP

Culture, education, advertising, promotions

Perceptions, conscious or unconscious of:

• Wellbeing• Success

• Risk assessment

• Beliefs• Ignorance• Sectoral interests

AspirationsEnergy supply/demand Climate

systemClimate impacts

Pearman, 2012, Australasian J. Environ. Manag. 19, 144-163

A Crisis of Expertise

Melbourne School of Government

Assessing climate-change risk is complex

Ideally involving simultaneous attention to:

• The global carbon budget:• How that might unfold through, say, the rest of this century, to relate potential future emissions to a rise in atmosphere CO2

• How the climate system will respond:• To a specified rise of CO2 (with feedbacks)

• How natural/anthropogenic systems will respond:• Such as water supplies, agriculture, natural ecosystems, coastal inundation, human health, etc


Melbourne School of GovernmentFebruary 15-16, 2018

Scie

nti

sts

/ex

pert

s

IPCCInternational Framework

Convention on Climate Change

Media

Dep

art

men

tal/ c

orp

ora

te

ad

vis

ers

Contracts

Briefings

Literature

Public

perception

Ministers

Cabinets

Boards

CEOs

Conferences

Community

groups

Peak bodies

Po

lic

y m

ak

ers

PMSEIC

Focus groups

Opportunistic

The Science-Policy Interface

ConstructivismIdeas of the way the world is, constructed from

& heavily influenced by, subjective perceptions,

rules & beliefs

RationalismIdeas of the way the world is,

based on observation,

measurement & rational

deduction

Rational sectorally-defined

description of the real world

Rational holistically- defined

description of the real world

Evidence-based

policy development

Policy development

The “non-reality world”

Filtered by, vested interests, special pleading, conservatism, etc.

February 15-16, 2018A Crisis of Expertise


Holistic assessments are difficult because:

• Sectoral nature of society, its governments, knowledge generation and businesses

• Tending to bias decisions towards singular solutions (picking winners)

• Nature of individual behaviour, our aspirations and motivations

• Mostly unconscious, tending to resist change or subjectively predetermine the direction of strategies

• Societal norms and institutions• Resulting from societal evolution that is largely non-

strategic and thus not necessarily appropriate for the future



Multi sectoral planning is largely inconsistent with sectoral division

Major social

sector

Potential negative impacts

Knowledge

generation

• Research is often disciplinary/reductionist

• Can fail to underpin simultaneous delivery of

wealth, societal realities, broader human

aspirations & imperatives

• Reductionism is necessary but insufficient

Modes of

government

operation

Focus on ministerial responsibility or ideology can

lead to interdepartmental competition rather than

collaboration

Corporate

world

Nature of individual enterprises can work against

the incorporation of other world views/ideas about

directions & the future

Barratt, Pearman & Waller (2010) : In

Resilience and Transformation:

Preparing Australia for Uncertain

Futures. CSIRO Press

August 22, 2017 Monash MastersJuly 28, 2011Renewable Energy in Australian

Australian Energy and Utility Summit ‘11

“The great enemy of the truth is very often not the lie --deliberate, contrived and dishonest, but the myth, persistent, persuasive, and unrealistic. Belief in myths allows the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought”

John F. Kennedy (1917 - 1963)

Is humanity & policy development, in the throes of a changing balance between constructivism &

rationalism? Evidenced by:

• A greater dependence on poorly assessed information,

supported by an ever-growing inter-connectiveness• The internet & social media in the wider community but also within the policy-development

community?

• The changing nature of investment in Science & science

education• Focus on short-term potential for wealth generation & sectorally determined imperatives

• Less so on knowledge for knowledge sake & broader enlightenment?

• Externally driven hypothesis testing that is:• In ignorance of the frontiers of scientific knowledge

• Dismissive of investment in Science targeting the improvement of understanding of the

realities of the world compared with those that are constructed



Response to threatening messages

Emotional responses

Coping Mechanisms

Anxious Minimising

Scared Denying

Sad Avoiding

Threat Depressed Scepticism

Numb Desensitises

Helpless Depend on others

Hopeless Resigned

Frustrated Cynical

Angry Fed up



“Global warming and climate change: what Australia knew

and buried…......then framed a new reality for the public” Maria Taylor (Taylor 2014)

Reasons include:

• Growth of a central role of neo-liberal economics

• Focus on wealth generation impacting, public good, timescales, wellbeing

• Economic zealots

• Fossil fuel industry got act together to deny the need for or

delay action on climate change

• Sections of media support a new narrative• Essential role of coal• Scepticism concerning the science

• Movement of personnel between the government

bureaucracy & commerce/industry• A form of lobbying

Is there a crisis of expertise?

Some indicators related to climate change

• Hand picking "expert" panels

• Australian Government’s review of renewable energy target

• Choosing to ignore advice that is not convenient or in turn with

ideologies

• Dr Alan Finkel, Independent Review into the Future Security of the National

Electricity Market

• Ignoring experts

• The 2015 Energy White paper, prepared by the Department of Industry,

Innovation & Science

• Direction of the national research agency

• Emasculation of the CSIRO climate research with serious inroads into its

natural resources research




e.g. Direction of the national research agency

Needed

• A research portfolio that respects diversity of needs &

available resources

• Research to underpin policy

Reasons for concern• Who sets the priorities

• Trends in the support of Science

• Removal of Science from a separate portfolio




Other factors:

• Demise of independent bureaucracies• By-passing

• Manipulating

• Expansion of social media

• Sectoralised society• The need for a balance between disciplinarity & holism



Governance culture

• “many of the problems of effective

government in Australia at present relate to the

administrative culture”

• the public service “was capable of strategic

thinking, anticipating problems and providing

expert advice on what worked and what didn’t”

• We need a “return to a system that makes

evaluation and the development of evidence-

based policy mandatory”

Michael Keating, former head of the Australian Public ServiceA Crisis of Expertise


Social media

• “We have created tools that are ripping apart the social fabric of how our society works”

• “No civil discourse, no cooperation, misinformation, mistruth”

• “bad actors can manipulate large swaths of people to do anything you want”

Chamath Palihapitiya, former head, User Growth, Facebook, in a presentation at Stanford Graduate School of Business



Social media

• “doing in our children’s brains”

• “social-validation feedback loops” that exploit weaknesses in human psyche

Former President of Facebook, Sean Parker

• Facebook lies about its ability to influence individuals based on the data it collects on them

Attributed to Antonio García Martínez former “ads targeting product manager”, author Chaos Monkey



Centre for Humane Technology

“A group of Silicon Valley technologists who were early employees at Facebook and Google, alarmed over the ill effects of social networks and smart phones, are banding together to challenge the companies they helped build”

The New York Times, February 4, 2018



Social media

•“The old idea of the on-line world as a burgeoning utopia is in retreat”

• “Two billion people actively use Facebook; at

least 3-5 billion are reckoned to be online”

• We have three technology companies... • “who have the system that frankly they don't even

have control over..

• ... 2 billion people's minds are already jacked into this

automated system, and its steering people’s thoughts

towards either personalised paid advertising

misinformation or conspiracy theories”

The Guardian Weekly, 05/01/2018



Social media

“A modern society cannot function without a social division of labor. No one is an expert on everything”

“The Internet tends to generate communities ….. dedicated to confirming their own pre-existing beliefs rather than challenging them. And social media only amplifies this echo chamber….”

“Information technology….is not the problem. The digital age … offering an apparent shortcut to erudition. It allowed people to mimic intellectual accomplishments by indulging in an illusion of expertise provided by a limitless supply of facts”

John Menadue, Pearls and Irritations

Some key messages particularly re climate (1)

• Call for national policies that reflect the very best evidence base

• Call out political actions that:• Promote ideologies or constructed world-views

• Ignore strategic dimensions

• Utilise & support the conduct of peer reviewed Science

• Recognise that that knowledge will never be as complete or as inclusive as we might wish

• Yet risk has to be managed not deferred



Some key messages particularly re climate (2)

• Climate change is a reflection of:• The way we are as individuals

• Our expectations, culture, history, education, market economy, advertising

• Much of which is subconscious yet changeable

• Our institutional structures• Governance, shared behavioural norms, legal frameworks

• The outcomes we seek are:• Holistic decisions & business opportunities

• Purposeful societal evolution towards a resilient & sustainable future (strategic)



Pearman and Härtel (2010). Climate change: Are we up to the challenge? in Managing Climate Change. CSIRO Publishing, Melbourne.

“ the most important lesson learned from the climate change issue may be that societal

evolution, as devoid of direction and long-term strategy as it is, has led our behaviour and societal institutions in directions that are unsustainable….

in many … ways”.

climate change, science and policy - … · april 05, 2011 the climate change issue emissions...

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