Uncertainty in Policy Making: Values and Evidence in Complex Decisions

Uncertainty in Policy Making: Values and Evidence in Complex Decisions, by Michael Heazle, London and Washington, DC, Earthscan, 2010, xviii + 185 pp., £60.00 (hardback), ISBN 978-1-84971-083-1

Michael Heazle's book focuses on the nature and use of knowledge in international policy making and the ways in which uncertainty is used in and influences such policy making. Heazle's analysis of uncertainty is developed around two major case studies, one of which is global warming, so it is appropriate that the book should be published in Earthscan's Science in Society Series.

Heazle starts from the premise that uncertainty or limitations of knowledge are inevitable but that the ways in which policy makers respond to and use these limitations are grounded in and reflects their values, ideology and objectives. Thus in the case of Iraq, key policy makers in the USA, UK and Australia chose to disregard the uncertainties over Saddam Hussein's possession of Weapons of Mass Destruction and decided to invade Iraq to ensure that if Saddam Hussein did have such weapons, he did not use them. He argues that the Bush administration adopted a ‘precautionary approach’ to Iraq's supposed Weapons of Mass Destruction as indicated by ‘Vice-President Dick Cheney's ‘One Percent Doctrine’ – that is, the perception of even only a 1% chance of a threat existing must be treated as a certainty’ (p. 8). In contrast, policy makers in both the USA and Australia, though not the UK, have taken a very different approach to the uncertainties associated with global warming. Despite the scientific consensus that greenhouse gases are causing an irreversible change in the earth's climate, these policy makers have justified inaction in terms of the uncertainties of the evidence.

Heazle sets his analysis of policy making within the context of the enlightenment enterprise. He argues that elite policy makers justify their policy making in terms of its rationality. Their justifications are based on a supposition that policies are based on the best available evidence, knowledge created by experts especially scientists, and that when policy is shown to be defective policy makers deflect blame onto these experts arguing they did not provide adequate knowledge. Thus, when invading coalition troops were unable to find Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq, key policy makers blamed intelligence analysts, especially the CIA.

As Heazle notes, the rational model of policy making is based on the assumption that experts are independent and objective, and that their evidence informs and shapes policy decisions. However, in reality as I noted (Alaszewski 2011) in a discussion of the role of Andrew Wakefield in the MMR controversy, experts are often partisan and use various strategies to influence policy makers and decision making. Furthermore, the relationship between policy-making and experts can be inverted, with policy makers making policy decisions based on their values and ideology and then using experts as consultants to justify their decisions.

Heazle devotes rather less attention to a related dimension of modern policy making, its utopian character. The aim of modern policy makers is not only to be rational in claiming that their decisions are based on the best available evidence, they also claim their policies will create a better future. Such utopianism was at the heart of the Iraq disaster. The Weapons of Mass Destruction were important, they represented both a threat and evidence of the ‘evilness’ of the Iraqi regime. Key policy makers envisaged creating a new Iraq that was not only without Weapons of Mass Destruction, but also one in which a hostile authoritarian Baathist dictatorship was replaced by a sympathetic liberal democratic nation state. It is this utopian ambition which failed so catastrophically and has led to the inquiries into the how and why the decision to invade Iraq was made.

Having just published a study of health policy making (Alaszewski and Brown 2011) that explored the limitation of rational policy making and the influence of disasters, claims making, ideology and the media, I was looking forward to reading and reviewing Heazle's book. It does draw on interesting material and it is good to have a detailed study of two major and controversial policy issues. However, I found the presentation off-putting, this is not an easy book to read and is marred by too much jargon. I also felt that at times it was tilting at windmills. Uncertainty does provide the context for human decision-making including policy making, but its nature and impact varies. What is unusual about both the Iraq and the global warming cases is that such small levels of uncertainty were so relentlessly exploited to disregard so much contrary evidence.

© 2012, Andy Alaszewski

http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13698575.2011.648423