When economics hits politics it is difficult to determine when the economist becomes the advocate (see, e.g., the green jobs thread at this blog and, most recently, comments on this post). Fisheries scientists have the same problem. Serendipitously, here is how AFS President Bill Franzin addressed it in the January 2009 issue of Fisheries (page 4):
In this article, I review an important issue about the adoption of policy positions by a professional scientific society such as AFS: the fine line between scientific objectivity and advocacy. ...
This seems on the surface a simple dichotomy, as it is the difference between using science to actively support a particular cause with respect to a resource issue (clearly advocacy) and providing objective scientific information on an issue and encouraging the decision makers to find a solution that yields the best outcome for the natural resource (in my mind, the role of a professional society like AFS). A professional society has to be very careful not to engage in the former position because (a) you marginalize your science and professionalism, and (b) you could lose your status as a professional society with regulators and affect your non-profit status. Interestingly, the same conundrum plagues an individual scientist as well; how far can you go in supporting your personal resource agenda before your “objective science” is brought into question by your peers and the public? ...
Should we stay out of the policy arena altogether and just put our science out there and let it be used, or not, in the development of important resource policy decisions, or should we actively engage in advocating particular resource policy positions? Scott et al. (2008) provide advice in their article on the roles and responsibilities of scientists and professional scientific societies at the science-policy interface. In their view, scientists and professional societies should engage in policy development but they must be careful how they do it. They point out that science is just one of the factors that decision makers must take into account in the development of policies and management strategies. The role of science is to inform policy development at every step where it can have an impact on the outcome. Here, inform means to provide the science analysis of all sides of the issue to all stakeholders in the discussion—objective scientific analyses of various policy outcomes. ...
Reference: Scott, J. M. et al. 2007. Policy advocacy in science: prevalence, perspectives, and implications for conservation biologists. Conservation Biology 21:29-35.
This seems on the surface a simple dichotomy, as it is the difference between using science to actively support a particular cause with respect to a resource issue (clearly advocacy) and providing objective scientific information on an issue and encouraging the decision makers to find a solution that yields the best outcome for the natural resource (in my mind, the role of a professional society like AFS). A professional society has to be very careful not to engage in the former position because (a) you marginalize your science and professionalism, and (b) you could lose your status as a professional society with regulators and affect your non-profit status. Interestingly, the same conundrum plagues an individual scientist as well; how far can you go in supporting your personal resource agenda before your “objective science” is brought into question by your peers and the public? ...
Should we stay out of the policy arena altogether and just put our science out there and let it be used, or not, in the development of important resource policy decisions, or should we actively engage in advocating particular resource policy positions? Scott et al. (2008) provide advice in their article on the roles and responsibilities of scientists and professional scientific societies at the science-policy interface. In their view, scientists and professional societies should engage in policy development but they must be careful how they do it. They point out that science is just one of the factors that decision makers must take into account in the development of policies and management strategies. The role of science is to inform policy development at every step where it can have an impact on the outcome. Here, inform means to provide the science analysis of all sides of the issue to all stakeholders in the discussion—objective scientific analyses of various policy outcomes. ...
Reference: Scott, J. M. et al. 2007. Policy advocacy in science: prevalence, perspectives, and implications for conservation biologists. Conservation Biology 21:29-35.
