More than Just Talk: Connecting Science and Decisionmaking

Wicked Problems and Applied Economics

“…Sharing viewpoints and knowledge went both ways. For example, the faculty found that stakeholders did not always distinguish between important concepts such as weather and climate, nor between risk and uncertainty (Jacobs, Garfin, and Lenart 2005).…”

“…agencies on federal projects; integrated assessments 12 are part of many federal programs (e.g., the U.S. Global Climate Change Research Program); and there are increasing congressional demands for greater accountability of federal science budgets to benefit society (Jacobs, Garfin, and Lenart 2005;Pielke and Byerly 1998;Shabman 2000;Stephenson 2000).…”

“…Linking insights and knowledge to action is a large challenge (Ingram and Bradley 2006;Jacobs, Garfin, and Lenart 2005;Stephenson and Shabman 2007); achieving and implementing a negotiated consensus on which actions will be undertaken is a complicated process that takes time and resources (Jacob, Garfin, and Lenart. 2005).…”

“…Effective engagement of stakeholders is challenging (Jacobs, Garfin, and Lenart 2005;McDowell 2001). While there are resources that help to guide critical engagement, and extension faculty have been pursuing such engagement for decades, there remains more to learn (Fear et al 2006).…”

“…There needs to be more study of and familiarity with the methods of effective engagement which would include the development of management and leadership skills that are able to incorporate and integrate the knowledge, skills, resources, and perspectives from many actors (Ingram and Bradley 2006). There needs to be a willingness and ability to understand the social and historical contexts surrounding policy formulation as well as how decisions are actually made (Batie 2005;Jacobs, Garfin, and Lenart 2005).…”