| Title: |
Public Participation in Environmental Assessment and Decision Making
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| Resource Type: |
document --> technical publication --> book / book chapter(s)
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| Country: |
USA
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| Year of publication: |
2008 |
| Author 1/Producer: |
National Research Council
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| Other Authors/Producers: |
Thomas Dietz and Paul C. Stern, Editors, Panel on Public Participation in Environmental Assessment and Decision Making, National Research Council
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| Author / Producer Type: |
University research group / research institute
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| ISBN: |
ISBN-13: 978-0-309-12543-7
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EUGRIS Keyword(s): |
Contaminated land-->Wider impacts / sustainability-->Social
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| Short description: |
Well-designed public consultations improve environmental
decision-making according to a new report from the US National Research
Council (NRC). It also increases the legitimacy of these decisions for
those affected by them, making it more likely that the decisions will
be implemented effectively.
The NRC report makes a series of specific recommendations to get the
best out of public participation in environmental decision-making. One
key message from the study is that there is no single model for how to
involve the public in a decision-making process - consultations must be
carefully planned and matched to the context of the type of assessment
being carried out. This report is a step towards that, but the NRC
calls for social science research to address this specific issue in the
future.
The NRC established the Panel on Public Participation in Environmental
Assessment and Decision Making to carry out this report. The aim was to
assess whether, and under what conditions, public participation
achieves the desired outcomes - where a decision is reached after
consideration of all affected parties and where all affected feel their
views have been taken into account.
Advocates have long argued that those members of the public affected by
a particular environmental plan must be consulted and involved. But
critics point out that this slows the assessment process and hampers
the quality of the final decision.
The new study describes how to avoid these pitfalls and to use
consultation to enhance public trust. It also explains how to build and
evolve the process of public consultation to undertake better
environmental assessment. The report recommends that consultation
should be fully incorporated into environmental assessment as a
mandatory part of the process, not just a formality. It stresses that
the public must have good faith that their views will be taken
seriously and incorporated into the final decision as, without public
confidence, the exercise is futile.
The report also presents checklists of requirements for best practice.
This includes a list of prerequisites for agencies undertaking public
consultation to ensure that they have:
clarity of purpose
a commitment to use the findings from the process to inform their decisions
adequate resources for the whole process
a commitment to learn from experience and seek feedback so that future
consltation processes can be modified and improved.
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Finally the report proposes that social science research into public
participation should be conducted by any agency or organisation
planning to carry it out. Open and shared results from such studies
would help inform the design of future consultations.
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Submitted By:
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Professor Paul Bardos WhoDoesWhat?
Last update: 10/10/2008
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