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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
A Crisis of Expertise
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
Melbourne School of Government
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
February 15-16, 2018A Crisis of Expertise
Melbourne School of Government
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
February 15-16, 2018A Crisis of Expertise
Melbourne School of Government
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
A Crisis of Expertise
Melbourne School of GovernmentFebruary 15-16, 2018
“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
A Crisis of Expertise
Melbourne School of GovernmentFebruary 15-16, 2018
Is there a crisis of expertise?
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
A Crisis of Expertise
Melbourne School of GovernmentFebruary 15-16, 2018
Is there a crisis of expertise?
Other factors:
• Demise of independent bureaucracies• By-passing
• Manipulating
• Expansion of social media
• Sectoralised society• The need for a balance between disciplinarity & holism
A Crisis of Expertise
Melbourne School of GovernmentFebruary 15-16, 2018
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
Melbourne School of GovernmentFebruary 15-16, 2018
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
A Crisis of Expertise
Melbourne School of GovernmentFebruary 15-16, 2018
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
A Crisis of Expertise
Melbourne School of GovernmentFebruary 15-16, 2018
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
A Crisis of Expertise
Melbourne School of GovernmentFebruary 15-16, 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
A Crisis of Expertise
Melbourne School of GovernmentFebruary 15-16, 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
February 15-16, 2018A Crisis of Expertise
Melbourne School of Government
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)
February 15-16, 2018A Crisis of Expertise
Melbourne School of Government
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”.
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