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Report n°2: An integrated approach to economic and social contestability in business

Reporting unconfirmed scientific facts

However, let us assume that the recycler has succeeded in setting up a technical research activity on his waste products. Its objective is to design and test different technical and scientific scenarios that could resolve or mitigate the initial problem. Each scenario must be evaluated for its viability, taking into account scientific knowledge, health and environmental regulations and economic imperatives.

Suppose that the research carried out has uncovered new scientific data, but not data from which firm conclusions can be drawn. This situation applies when the research results are obtained under specific conditions and in a strictly-controlled environment, thus limiting the extent to which they may be applied generally. Results obtained in laboratories, for example, would need to be validated using semi-industrial prototypes, requiring investment beyond the scope of the recycler. The consequence is that the recycler is left with new questions, and no means of getting the categoric answers they require.

The recycler will compare this situation, where scientific facts are not confirmed, to earlier episodes which challenged the business, also on the basis of ambiguous and partial information, but which, because of the "challenging vigilance" of some NGOs and public authorities, resulted in regulatory changes that have disrupted the recycler's business. A previous experience like this is bound to influence the way in which the recycler decides to manage the reporting of the results of his research. He will choose not to communicate unconfirmed scientific information that could provoke new concerns and a new contestation to his activity.

Were all the different parties involved to trust one another, the fact that some scientific data gives partial information and not well-established results , and that their interpretation is still subject to conflicting points of view, would not be sufficient to challenge the business radically. These circumstances would favour transparent communication of results within the trusted network. It is quite a different thing when the operator is periodically subjected to challenging vigilance. The operator is then forced to be cautious when disseminating information about unconfirmed scientific results.

The context to consider in explaining this prudence involves firstly the conditions under which latent social contestation changes to an explicit environmental and health contestation; and secondly the degree of influence of a lay understanding of the precautionary principle as a requirement of an hypercautious approach aiming at nipping threats of possible hazards in the bud (Godard et al, 2002) on a nascent movement for social contestation. When the precautionary principle is understood as shifting the burden of proof on business and demanding the proof of a complete absence of risks to health and the environment, which is not the established legal and political doctrine in Europe at all, disseminating uncertain data that could possibly be read as supporting the existence of certain risks to the publiccould be enough to spark off a movement challenging the business potentially responsible for those, still hypothetical, risks.

From the recycler's perspective, making his research data public could be enough to escalate opposition to the business because of its local nuisance (smell, noise etc.) into a much more generalised protest under the banner of a community issue ("the environment", or "public health"). This would then justify intervention by the public authorities.

Even though the data base is dubious, a recycler having exposed assets could reasonably expect the result to be a contestation to the continuation of his business. This picture of a potential crisis is all the more plausible when there is already latent or active opposition to the business. Opponents are quick to seize on doubts and controversies over the alleged risks, and to invoke them with the precautionary principle as reasons for closing the business down.

The chance that he himself could initiate a challenge to the way in which he carries on business in the future is bound to affect the recycler's strategy. It will limit his inclination to play a full role as regulator of the legitimacy of activity throughout the branch.