Advancing a transformative social contract for the environmental sciences: From public engagement to justice

Abstract

Taking as a starting point Jane Lubchenco’s call for a renewed social contract for environmental science, this paper advances a framework for science’s place in society in which justice is central. A social contract is a desired vision of social order that distributes rights, responsibilities, and obligations among political actors. The magnitude of global ecological change, our collective inability to address ecological crises, and populist challenges to science have renewed interest in debates about existing social contracts with science. While Lubchenco’s vision of a social contract focuses on practical ways to improve the engagement of scientists with decision-makers and citizens, we argue that to achieve the objectives laid out by Lubchenco, justice—encompassing representation, distribution, and recognition—must be at the core of science-society relations. A justice-centred social contract with science requires acknowledgement on the part of scientists, administrators, decision-makers, and citizens of the biases, inequalities and inequities contained within and advanced by academic institutions. Orienting science towards justice provides a starting point for a more diverse, inclusive, and equitable culture of publicly-funded research.