Bernabo Perspectives and Principles from Other Assessments Chris Bernabo Many assessments of complex environmental issues have failed to meet the needs of the decision makers they were intended to serve. The emphasis must be on providing practical information in an easily usable form.
Scientists ultimately seek to understand an issue while the decision makers' job is to decide.
Decisions usually have deadlines and must be based on whatever level of scientific understanding exists, taking account of all the other societal factors that apply to the decision. In short, science is a culture based on objective facts, proof, rationality, measurements, and incremental progress. Policy, on the other hand, is a culture based on subjective human values, beliefs, emotions, perceptions, deadlines, and crises. Effective and useful assessments must bridge these two cultures, and so must not only be technically sound but also policy credible. Making the assessment policy-credible depends on how transparent, inclusive and unbiased the whole process is perceived to be by stakeholders.