Fabien Medvecky

ethics and using MCDA in environmental decision making.

  1. Issues with the decision process:

  1. Who is invited? Who decides who is invited(watch for infinite regress)? What are the criteria for being in the decision making process? Is the process based on direct representation or can it be indirect with agents (think here of issues to do with eloquence and arguing skills a lawyer would have compared to some comunity representative- are there issues of jusitce here?)

  2. how much weight does each member get and how many members can each represented group put forward. that is, does each member get one vote? and say this is a decision about logging a forest with four companies involved, do each of the companies have a representative (in effect four votes for the logging companies), or are the logging companies represented as one block? This would have to do with the previous question in point a) of who is invited. issues with power voting. consider the early days of EEC. 6 countries with voting power as follows: france 4;italy 4; germany 4; belgium 2; holland 2; luxemburg 1. Quota was set at 12, such that for a bill to pass, there was a mininmum requirment of 12 votes. Either the three big voters or two big voters and bel+ holl. Luxemburg had no say. Also the real voting power can change based on whether there is an odd or even number of participants. Think of a votin scenario with 2 main parties making up 10 votes (5 each) + 1 independant. The independant holds the balance of power. Now make that 11 votes for the main parties (5 and 6 votes), the independant can only bring in a hung a decision, it can only at best stop a bill, never push one through

  1. Issues with democracy

  1. What is the relationship of the electorate to the decision making body/ decision makers? How do we keep demcratic accountability? Are the decision makers subjected to elections on a regular basis? if yes, who constitutes their electorate (electorates need not be geographical/ nationalistically defined)?

  2. Transparency. Should the full decision making process be made available to the eleted body (parliament) or only some of the decision proces? What would be the justifications for NOT providing the elected representatives in parliamnet wiht the full information. For governement decisions, should the full decision process be made available to the gnereal public?

just some thoughts to get started

  1. Issues with time
  1. We have good reasons to think our evaluation of outcomes changes with time. Indeed values are somehow dynamic: I may value a piece of forest a certain way today, but that value may change over time. The longer the decision, the more likely the subjective value of an outcome will change. How do we allow for change of value over time? Can we impose our present values onto future people?
  1. Issues with rationality and preferences

  1. information. How much informations should people get/ be given? I take it full information is never possible, so how much information is the minimum? is there a minimum? Who decides on which information is relevant?

  2. rationality. Must the preferences be based on the facts given? Who decides whether a participant is competent? If considering a project near a mental home, should the patients be participants in the decision? When dealing with issues of species and evolution, should creationists be participants? If different participants disagree on fundamental facts (eg. creationists and biologists) can the preferences be meaningfully compared? Are either rational or competent? IS their a minimum set of shared beliefs required (especially re (empirical) facts)?

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