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On Tuesday, a group of European health and environmental NGOs sent a letter to the president-elect of the European commission, Jean-Claude Juncker, urging him to “scrap” the position of chief scientific adviser to the president of the Commission, a role currently held by Professor Anne Glover. On seeing this demand, my thoughts immediately turned to Richard Nixon.
More than 40 years ago, US president Richard Nixon abolished the president’s council of advisers on science and technology. He also transferred the role of presidential science adviser to the National Science Foundation, far away from the White House. Nixon took these actions because he was unhappy that many of his science advisers opposed the Vietnam War, anti-ballistic missile defence and supersonic transport.
The European NGOs calling for the abolishment of the chief scientific adviser, which include Greenpeace, are taking a page right out of Nixon's playbook. Don’t like the science advice you are getting? Then fire your science adviser. Or better yet, abolish the position altogether so that you’ll never need to hear unwelcome advice in the future.
Who do the NGOs think should be advising the commission's president? Themselves of course. As their letter says: “We hope that you as the incoming commission president will decide not to nominate a chief scientific adviser and that instead the commission will take its advice from a variety of independent, multi-disciplinary sources, with a focus on the public interest.”
While it is easy to ridicule the recommendation to abolish the science adviser, there is some merit in the complaints levied by the disaffected NGOs. They express concern that the CSA has been “unaccountable, intransparent and controversial”, singling out public statements by Anne Glover on genetically modified organisms.
Perhaps surprisingly, these groups find an ally in these complaints in none other than Glover herself who recently complained about the politicization of science advice within the European Union: “What happens at the moment – whether it’s in commission, parliament or council – is that time and time again, if people don’t like what’s being proposed, what they say is that there is something wrong with the evidence.”
In the context of European and US political battles over science, partisans on both sides like to point to what they believe to be a fundamental defect in the ability of their opponents to appreciate science. But history tells a far more nuanced story.
Even before President Nixon abolished PSAC and transferred his science adviser, there were political conflicts between the science advisers and the president. Political scientist Bruce Bimber observes that “the inherent contradiction in PSAC’s mission as a neutral player in the White House produced strains even by the end of the Kennedy administration … Cracks in the relationship widened when [President] Johnson assumed office.” While Nixon was a Republican, both Kennedy and Johnson were Democrats.
The urge to sack the adviser or the advisory apparatus entirely is a common one. We’ve seen it under Presidents George W Bush and Barack Obama, and also in the governments of Gordon Brown and David Cameron. While partisans like to squabble over whose behavior is worse, there are clearly dynamics at work here that go deeper than political differences.
Bimber noted this in the context of 1960s and 1970s presidential science advice, observing that science advisors “found that adhering to ideals of objectivity raised questions about their loyalty and fitness to serve the White House, while too close an adherence to political interests undermined their credibility as an apolitical technical elite.”
This is a fundamental tension for any adviser in government, who has to help implement a specific political agenda and at the same time provide independent advice, which may not always be welcomed or supportive of that agenda.
Anne Glover explains: “When I spoke to president Barroso about taking up this role, I said to him that for me it would only be attractive if I was regarded as an independent chief scientific adviser ... for me to have any value or credibility, I need to focus on evidence and not on political considerations.”
One popular school of thought, particularly among scientists and other experts, is that the expert adviser should sit outside or even above government. This was the view expressed in a 2012 House of Lords report which recommended that governmental science advisers should sit outside the civil service and be given a ring-fenced budget. The appeal of delegating advice to heroic “philosopher kings” is understandable, but always falls short of the ideal in practice.
Another school of thought, shared by Richard Nixon and Greenpeace, that we can simply do away with science advice, is just as untenable. In today’s world where decision making not only requires expert knowledge, but an ability to navigate contested claims, uncertainties and vested interests, science advice is more important than ever.
Rather than scrapping the commission CSA, incoming President Juncker has an opportunity to clarify and improve the functions of the office. Is there to be a more formal process for the president and commissioners to request advice? If so, this process and the resulting advice should be made publicly available. Does the CSA address questions addressed best by science? An example would be the preparation of a report on the environmental risks of neonicotinoids on bee populations. Alternatively, the CSA could weigh in on policy options, most effectively by characterising available options or by expanding the scope of options available. Such “honest brokering of policy options” is not often done well.
Two roles seem inappropriate. One would be to serve as an independent advocacy voice, a position that Glover has occasionally taken on in expressing her strong support for GM crop technologies. Such advocacy prompted José Manuel Barroso to issue a statement last year explaining that “her views do not necessarily represent the views of the commission.” Another inappropriate role would be to advocate for whatever policies are proposed by the president or the EC. Glover would appear to agree: “What I am going to propose for the next president of the European commission is to try and develop a new system of evidence gathering within the commission that entirely disconnects evidence gathering with the political imperative.”
Improving science advice in Europe will depend on improving advisory processes, not scrapping them. This requires an open conversation about what role the CSA is expected to play in advising the president of the European commission, informed by the large body of theory and experience we now have available about what makes for successful science advice.
Roger Pielke Jr is professor of environmental studies in the Centre for Science and Technology Policy Research at the University of Colorado and author of The Honest Broker: Making Sense of Science in Policy and Politics. On Twitter he is@RogerPielkeJr
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