Scientists and environmental policy: a Canadian-U.S. perspective.

• Author: Alm, Leslie R.

Leslie R. Alm is an associate professor of political science and public policy and administration at Boise State University. He holds an undergraduate degree from the U.S. Military Academy at West Point and a doctorate in political science from Colorado State University. His recent research centers on the U.S.-Canada acid rain debate, emphasizing the science-policy linkage to environmental policy making: it has been published in Science, Technology and Human Values, The Social Science Journal, State and Local Government Review, and The Journal of Environmental Systems. E-mail: lalm@boisestate.edu

1. INTRODUCTION

   Recent research by Donald Alper and James Loucky documents the new realities of the social, economic, and political landscape of North America where "transnational contacts and interactions have called into question the traditional national sovereignty function of borders, stirring controversy about new relationships and forms of association that transcend national functions." (1) Alper and Loucky contend that the areas of greatest convergence will be related to common interests and geography with environmental concerns being the most likely catalyst for greater transnational cooperation. The formation of the Commission for Environmental Cooperation (CEC) under the auspices of the North American Agreement on Environmental Cooperation (NAAEC) to help prevent potential trade and environmental conflicts and to promote the effective enforcement of environmental law between Canada, Mexico, and the United States seems to bear out Alper and Loucky's contentions.

   Moreover, the recent release of the 1997 Continental Pollutant Pathways report by the CEC, which focuses on a lingering environmental problem (air pollution), suggests that the only way to address environmental concerns is through the lens of a transboundary and North American perspective. Victor Lichtinger, the executive director of the Secretariat of the CEC at the time of the report's release, (2) summarized this view:

   Acting alone, no nation of North America will be able to protect adequately its domestic environment or its citizens from pollutants transported along continental pathways. While pollutants are not constrained by political boundaries, programs to reduce them often are, and domestic decisions continue to be made with little reference to their implication for all of North America. (3)

   The release of the Continental Pollutant Pathways report appears to mark the beginning of a new era of transnational environmental cooperation. (4) There are great hopes that the North American Agreement on Environmental Cooperation, which went into effect in January of 1994 at the same time as the North American Free Trade Agreement, will actually foster trinational cooperation on the issue of continental pollutant pathways in North America.

   This movement toward a continental approach involving Canada, Mexico, and the United States is quite laudable. But it is important not to forget that it was preceded by a contentious debate at the national, bilateral, and global levels. In fact, just getting to the point where two of the countries that signed this trinational agreement (Canada and the United States) could establish a single bilateral accord on their transboundary air pollution took almost two decades of what some called a bitter and protracted policy disagreement. (5) The optimism posited by the formation of the CEC and release of the Pathways report must also be tempered by the knowledge that over the past several years, both the funds and human resources dedicated to scientific research on air pollution have declined substantially in Canada and the United States. (6)

   To establish a better understanding of the factors that foster successful cross-border environmental cooperation (as represented by the Pathways report), this study examines the existence of the earlier policy debate between Canada and the United States leading up to the 1991 signing of The Agreement Between the Government of the United States of America and the Government of Canada on Air Quality (commonly referred to as the Air Quality Accord). One of these factors is the linkage of science to environmental policy making. To date, there have been a plethora of studies establishing the preeminence of politics over science in coming to environmental policy agreements, (7) but there has been little written (and understood) from the scientists' perspective.

   The purpose of this study is to investigate the articulation of science in public policy within a transboundary, environmental, and political context from the perspective of the scientists who actively participated in the policy debate over transborder air pollution. (8) There will be a discussion of how scientists view the influence of science on environmental policy making and whether or not there is too much faith in science to solve environmental problems. There will also be a discussion of how scientists perceive both the transboundary nature of our environmental problems and the worth of bilateral environmental agreements.

   In addition, the study will highlight differences in perspectives between United States and Canadian scientists. This dichotomy is used because the formulation of the Air Quality Accord occurred (as noted earlier) only after a long and drawn-out policy debate between the United States and Canada which highlighted the fact that scientists in each country function under two distinct types of regulatory policy. (9) As Kathryn Harrison and George Hoberg point out, the Canadian approach relies heavily on scientific judgment and limits public debate about the scientific basis of policy decisions, while the United States approach is characterized by open conflict over regulatory science, including public debate over the interpretation of scientific evidence. (10) Harrison and Hoberg also observe that Canadian officials tend to place a greater emphasis on the truth-seeking character of science, whereas in the United States the regulatory process places greater emphasis on the value-laden policy components of science. (11)

   It has also been documented that the debate over transborder air pollution during the past several decades was marked by considerable mistrust between United States and Canadian scientists due to the politicization of the acid rain issue and its different significance for the two countries. (12) Scholars have provided evidence that, despite extensive collaboration between United States and Canadian scientists, each country responded differently to its cross-border air pollution problems and that the political controversy created by these different views was not only a handicap to joint Canadian-United States scientific research, but it defined a clear and drastic mismatch between what politics needs and science can offer. (13) This study will assess the significance of differences found between scientists on both sides of the border and provide a critique of what these differences mean to the resolution of future environmental policy problems. Finally, this study offers hope that the experience of formulating the contents of the Air Quality Accord at the bilateral level will be used to facilitate a more successful approach at the continental level, especially as it pertains to the part that science and scientists play.

2. BACKGROUND

   The Air Quality Accord, signed by Prime Minister Brian Mulroney and President George Bush on March 13, 1991, is said to have "marked a new era of cooperation aimed at helping guarantee cleaner air and a healthier environment for millions of Canadians and Americans." (14) Whether or not this has come about is still open to debate. But what is not debatable is that science and scientists have been central to the development of a transborder air pollution policy between Canada and the United States. (15) The role that scientists played in the policy discussion prior to the signing of the Air Quality Accord has been well documented by many scholars.

   Roy Gould asserts that the politics and science involved in the policies used to structure the Accord "became so thoroughly intertwined that they were barely distinguishable." (16) James Regens and Robert Rycroft are convinced that politics, economics, and science dominated the evolution of a United States-Canadian transboundary air pollution policy. (17) Others, while maintaining the prominence that scientific studies played in the evolution of the policy making, also documented what they believed were the misrepresentation and distortion of the science for political ends. (18) There are accusations that the "scientific community...felt the chilling effect of politics to a degree unprecedented in recent times" (19) and that "members of the scientific community [saw] their studies become political tokens in the debate while they themselves [became] sometimes willing, sometimes reluctant, political actors in the controversy." (20)

   Despite these questions of politicization, the importance of science and scientists to the establishment of agreements on transboundary air pollution is firmly set forth in the text of each of the transboundary air pollution agreements that Canada and the United States have reached since the advent of bilateral talks in the late 1970s. In the Memorandum of Intent Between the Government of Canada and the Government of the United States Concerning Transboundary Air Pollution (MOI), signed in August of 1980, it was "resolved as a matter of priority both to improve scientific understanding of the long range transport of air pollutants and its effects and to develop and implement policies, practices and technologies to combat its impact." (21) Furthermore, in coming to their conclusions that acid rain was a serious environmental and transboundary problem for both Canada and the United States, the authors of the 1986 Joint Report of the Special Envoys on Acid Rain cited their reliance on...