13) Public manager and environmental planners should engage the public even though they are limited about the scientific knowledge of an environmental issue. Political discussion with the public can produce the unexpected useful information which is required at complex uncertain modern ecosystem. For conducting more active adaptive management, this wide participation is desirable and the discussion is better in earlier stage of the policy process because to change previous decided plan is risky and may need additional material efforts. The process can diminish a sense of distance between modern people to more concern environmental problem and government, and improve public trust and democratic value. A variety of participation way such internet and video conference will be able to used to reflect the diverse opinion.
14) When we confront the problem that national park may be spoiled because of extracting the natural resource, the conservation value of the park can be estimated with the contingent valuation method. Urban area expansion into desert area or breaking mountain by dimension of urban development can face opposition of city residents who enjoy happiness to see natural scope such as desert and mountain. If the South Mountain of city of Phoenix is broken up by the city or state government to intend to enlarge the south area of phoenix, cityscape will be impaired. In order to address the environmental problems, the cost and benefit of resource collection and city planning should be measured. As the analysis method, the CV approach will be desirable because these situations and values are imaginary, and those can not be exchanged by the principle of demand and supply price in economic market.
15) In the case that air pollution resulted from firms within any region become an environmental issue, the cost of the pollution should be estimated. In order to resolve the pollution problem, tradable permits transacted in economic market have been much utilized. The permits can reflect the social cost of the pollution if the firms inform the transaction cost. Also, when we face the environmental problem that river to supply natural water is polluted by construction, the pollution cost can be gauged with the price of natural water transacted in economic market such as Walmart and Safeway. Since these situations and trade are realistic and besides occur in private market, the CV method is not appropriate.
Sustainability and Immigration
16 years ago
I really like your idea about using a video conference. That is something I completely overlooked. It's amazing what technology can accomplish, and in todays modern world, there is really no excuse for not engaging the public!
ReplyDeleteI agree with your analysis that public participation should take place early on, otherwise it might end up being very expensive if a different path is followed than the one originally proposed.
Thanks~
ReplyDeleteYeah~ Video conference will be very useful for the public to engage in the policy process, and additionally, it will increase the efficiency in policy decision in terms of time and space. Actually, many companies and international organization such as OECD is using the tool in decision making in order to overcome time and space, or cost problem of contacting each other interested parties. This tool will be able to be applied to the environmental policy process that government and the public should participate in. Especially, the environmental problem covers very broad area beyond any specific boundary, so that this strategy for the wide participation will be required in the policy process.