Precaution has been for years a controversial issue. Some regard it as a major regulatory innovation. Others as an inherently flawed concept. Some consider it an approach still in its beginning. Others believe it is a passing fashion. A narrow understanding of its relationship with knowledge and its distributional effects may explain why discussions on the US-EU divergence and on Europe’s own ambivalence about precaution fail to provide a consistent picture. This paper makes a case for a broader perspective: the issue of precaution is related to the social division of labour, namely the intimate connection between knowledge and power. The modern narrative, drawing a sharp divide between (science-based) production and use of knowledge, has faced growing public criticism. The controversy on precaution mixes up tradition and innovation in an ambiguous way, gaining special saliency in Europe vis-à-vis the elaboration of its social model. If tradition is increasingly in trouble, innovation has perils of its own.
Revolution or passing fashion? : reassessing the precautionary principle
Pellizzoni, Luigi
2009
Abstract
Precaution has been for years a controversial issue. Some regard it as a major regulatory innovation. Others as an inherently flawed concept. Some consider it an approach still in its beginning. Others believe it is a passing fashion. A narrow understanding of its relationship with knowledge and its distributional effects may explain why discussions on the US-EU divergence and on Europe’s own ambivalence about precaution fail to provide a consistent picture. This paper makes a case for a broader perspective: the issue of precaution is related to the social division of labour, namely the intimate connection between knowledge and power. The modern narrative, drawing a sharp divide between (science-based) production and use of knowledge, has faced growing public criticism. The controversy on precaution mixes up tradition and innovation in an ambiguous way, gaining special saliency in Europe vis-à-vis the elaboration of its social model. If tradition is increasingly in trouble, innovation has perils of its own.File | Dimensione | Formato | |
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Revolution or passing fashion-preprint.pdf
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