Scientific information in judicial and administrative systems

Abstract

There has arisen in recent times an increasing concern for the quality and interpretation of scientific and technical facts in both administrative (regulatory) and judicial decisions dealing with environment and health. Members of the scientific community have pointed to the poor quality of the scientific fabric used as the factual basis for decisions. Others fear an erosion of justice (as in the awarding of just compensation) if an excessively rigorous test for judging scientific material is demanded. Perhaps most important, this complex issue has made more explicit a debate over where the boundaries properly lie between scientific and social issues and how broadly those decisions should be shared. The emergence of this issue of how science should articulate with the public policy process follows a number of important trends of the past few years. One is a much augmented degree of public interest in health and risks to health. The rising tide of public concern for the environment of the past two decades turned in great part around issues of health—often as a surrogate for other environment qualities. This coincided with a period of increasing public demand for more direct public participation in the affairs of government. All of this together brought forth much more scientific and technical detail into broader public discussion than had been the pattern historically. Thirdly, the nation has turned to its courts more frequently and more prominently both to render ultimate decisions for the regulatory process and to review cases brought in the name of compensation for disease and disability. As a result of this latter, increasingly complex scientific and technical evidence has become the centerpiece of adversary proceedings and the court has become the locus for judging and interpreting science. In some cases, science itself has become the principal fodder for argumentation—leading to a debate over a seeming conflict between honoring the integrity of the factual basis for decisions versus the serving of a variety of social goals. In fact, both of these should be well accommodated. Decisions should rest on a respected body of fact and ultimate decisions should serve desired social endpoints. However, that dictates a separation between review and interpretation of scientific factual material from adversary proceedings. This has been the traditional experience in other parts of the western world. To perform in this way, however, does raise fundamental questions about how political power for these decisions should be shared.