The significance of meaning. Why IPBES needs

Innovation: The European Journal of Social Science Research

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The significance of meaning. Why IPBES needs the social sciences and humanities Jens Jetzkowitz, C.S.A. (Kris) van Koppen , Rolf Lidskog , Konrad Ott, Lieske Voget-Kleschin & Catherine Mei Ling Wong To cite this article: Jens Jetzkowitz, C.S.A. (Kris) van Koppen , Rolf Lidskog , Konrad Ott, Lieske Voget-Kleschin & Catherine Mei Ling Wong (2017): The significance of meaning. Why IPBES needs the social sciences and humanities, Innovation: The European Journal of Social Science Research, DOI: 10.1080/13511610.2017.1348933 To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13511610.2017.1348933

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Date: 26 July 2017, At: 10:37

Innovation: The European Journal of Social Science Research, 2017 https://doi.org/10.1080/13511610.2017.1348933

The significance of meaning. Why IPBES needs the social sciences and humanities Jens Jetzkowitza*, C.S.A. (Kris) van Koppen b, Rolf Lidskog Lieske Voget-Kleschind and Catherine Mei Ling Wonge

c

, Konrad Ottd,

a Department of Humanities and Social Sciences, Methods of empirical social research and statistics, Helmut Schmidt University, Holstenhofweg 85, D-22043 Hamburg, Germany; bEnvironmental Policy, Department of Social Sciences, Wageningen University, Hollandseweg 1, 6706KN Wageningen, Netherlands; cSchool of Humanities, Education and Social Sciences, Örebro University, SE-701 82 Örebro, Sweden; dDepartment of Philosophy, Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel, Leibnizstr. 6, D-24118 Kiel, Germany; eMaison des Sciences Humaines (E02 15-010) 11, Porte des Sciences, Institute of Geography and Spatial Planning, Université du Luxembourg, Campus Belval, L-4366 Esch-Belval, Luxembourg

(Received 2 November 2016; final version received 27 June 2017) The term “biodiversity” is often used to describe phenomena of nature, which can be studied without a reference to the socially constructed, evaluative, or indeed normative contexts. In our paper, we challenge this conception by focusing particularly on methodological aspects of biodiversity research. We thereby engage with the idea of interdisciplinary biodiversity research as a scientific approach directed at the recognition and management of contemporary society in its ecological embedding. By doing this, we explore how research on and assessments of biodiversity can be enhanced if meaning, aspiration, desires, and related aspects of agency are methodically taken into account. In six sections, we substantiate our claim that the discourse on biodiversity (including the IPBES (Intergovernmental science-policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services) debate) is incomplete without contributions from the social sciences and humanities. In the introduction, a brief overview of biodiversity’s conceptual history is provided showing that “biodiversity” is a lexical invention intended to create a strong political momentum. However, that does not impede its usability as a research concept. Section 2 examines the origins of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) by way of sociological discourse analysis. Subsequently, it proposes a matrix as a means to structure the ambiguities and tensions inherent in the CBD. The matrix reemphasizes our main thesis regarding the need to bring social and ethical expertise to the biodiversity discourse. In Section 3, we offer a brief sketch of the different methods of the natural and social sciences as well as ethics. This lays the groundwork for our Section 4, which explains and illustrates what social sciences and ethics can contribute to biodiversity research. Section 5 turns from research to politics and argues that biodiversity governance necessitates deliberative discourses in which participation of lay people plays an important role. Section 6 provides our conclusions. Keywords: biodiversity; social sciences; ethics; methodology; science–policy interface; foundations of biodiversity research; IPBES

*Corresponding author. Email: [email protected] © 2017 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited, and is not altered, transformed, or built upon in any way.

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1. Introduction It is still a widespread misbelief that the term “biodiversity” describes a purely natural phenomenon which can be studied with subordinated or even without reference to social and normative issues.1 By contrast, a brief overview of biodiversity’s history shows that the idea of investigating the diversity of species, habitats, and genes was originally motivated by concerns about increasing extinction rates (see Shetler 1991; Takacs 1996; Toepfer 2011, 360–361). “Biodiversity” is a concept that points to a distinctive problem encountered in the development of modern societies and the globalization of features specific to them. The term “biodiversity” was first used by a group of concerned biologists who wished to blow the whistle on the anthropogenically induced mass extinction of species and the degradation of natural ecosystems. The National Forum on BioDiversity, a conference held in Washington in 1986, is considered to be the originating event. Walter G. Rosen, one of the conference organizers, is said to have coined the term as a shorthand for “the richness of life” (see Noss, quoted by Takacs 1996, 51) that is threatened by societal development. The conference proceedings, issued by E. O. Wilson and F. M. Peter under the title “Biodiversity” in 1988, are deemed to have played a crucial role in boosting the use of the term. The fact that the number of publications employing the term has skyrocketed is a good indicator of the term’s success in setting the agenda of these concerned biologists. The stylish new word purports to provide a scientific basis for global attempts at nature conservation. Yet there is more to it. The concept of biodiversity not only describes natural variety but is also internally linked to certain objectives, such as conservation, sustainable use, and fair access and benefit sharing (ABS). Objectives are not natural entities. They constitute products of the mind’s ability to form perceptions of the world into representations, evaluate these, and communicate them to others. The natural sciences can neither substantiate objectives nor are they suited to clarifying the driving forces behind objectives, which are predominantly social in nature. Substantiating societal objectives falls into the domain of politics and ethics. Explaining how they come about and interpreting them falls into the domain of the social sciences. Hence, the biodiversity discourse necessitates expertise from the social sciences and ethics. In this paper, we explicate how these expertises can contribute to the discourse on biodiversity. If these considerations hold in general, they also hold for the main science-policy platform for biodiversity issues, the Intergovernmental sciencepolicy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) in particular. Before discussing the structure of this paper, we would like to briefly highlight why we concentrate on the concept of “biodiversity” even though the IPBES also refers to the concept of “ecosystem services” (ES). ES is an ambivalent concept that has been contested and sometimes rejected in environmental discourse and should not be adopted by the IPBES without careful scrutiny and further qualification. The combination of the words “ecosystem” and “services” was first introduced by Ehrlich and Ehrlich (1981).2 The first systematic use of the term by Ehrlich and Mooney (1983, 248) indicates that the authors were satisfied to have found a conceptual language to comprehensively communicate the drama of the loss of species caused by modern societies. Unlike the word “biodiversity” with its biological and scientific aura, the term “ES” is close to the semantic field of economics. The initial objective behind the ES approach was to point out that the destruction of nature entails real opportunity costs and that preserving ecosystems will pay off. The probably best-known study employing the concept, the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (MA), distinguishes provisioning, regulating, cultural, and supporting services (MA 2005). An important critique of the MA approach has targeted the delineation of


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different categories and the reduction of nature’s importance for humans to its instrumental value. In regard to the former, it has been criticized that the category of provisioning services might overlap with other services (“double counting”). As for the latter, it is argued that ES constitutes an anthropocentric concept and does not allow for intrinsic value of non-human beings and entities. Furthermore, while the category of cultural services is supposed to capture the importance humans assign to their non-instrumental relations to nature (such as aesthetic or spiritual relations), framing such relations as “services” is conceptually problematic. In the application of the concept, this conceptual problem regularly materializes in the form of marginalizing cultural services. Despite these shortcomings, the ES concept has some merit in that it bridges the gap between nature and human welfare. In pointing to the benefits and amenities that society and its members derive from natural environments, it opens a vast array of possibilities for social science studies. Furthermore, an ES perspective calls attention to the fact that not all components of biodiversity are beneficial to society (e.g. pests). Hence, the ES approach raises questions regarding the limits of justifying the conservation of all elements of biodiversity. To sum up, we acknowledge that the concept of ES features important pedagogical and didactic characteristics (see also Gómez-Baggethun et al. 2010; Jax and Heink 2015). Despite some caveats (see Jax and Heink 2015; Jetzkowitz 2011), we therefore subsume the ES concept under the general notion of protecting biodiversity. This paper explores the roles of social scientists and ethicists in biodiversity discourse. In the sections to follow, we substantiate the claim that the discourse on biodiversity (including the IPBES debate) is incomplete without contributions from the social sciences and humanities. Section 2 examines the origins of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) by way of sociological discourse analysis showing how a critical perspective helps to identify problems emerging from the inclusion and exclusion of knowledge and thus opens them up for discussion. Subsequently, it proposes a matrix as a means to structure the ambiguities and tensions inherent in the CBD. The matrix reemphasizes our main thesis regarding the need to bring sociological and ethical expertise to the biodiversity discourse. In Section 3, we offer a brief sketch of the different methods of the natural and social sciences as well as ethics. This lays the groundwork for our Section 4, which explains and illustrates what social sciences and ethics can contribute to biodiversity research. Section 5 turns from research to politics and argues that biodiversity governance necessitates deliberative discourses in which participation of lay people plays an important role. Section 6 provides our conclusions. 2. Understanding the take-off of biodiversity discourse: theCBD as setting the course The Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) is a multilateral treaty of now 196 parties and constitutes the most authoritative policy document on biodiversity to date. It entered into force on 29 December 1993. This date marks a first culmination of the biodiversity discourse. As such it played in important role in shaping the concept of biodiversity from 1993 onwards (see Vadrot 2014). 2.1. Networks and the key conflict in preparing the CBD, and how it framed the concept of biodiversity The CBD was opened for signature at the Rio de Janeiro Earth Summit in 1992. In preparing the CBD, different networks collaborated (see, e.g. Brand and Vadrot 2013; Suplie

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1995; Swanson 1997; van Koppen 2002). Three main networks can be distinguished. A first network encompassed members of the international nature conservation movement. In this network, the IUCN (World Conservation Union), a global organization for nature conservation with some 800 governmental and non-governmental members, and the government-based UNEP (United Nations Environment Programme) were highly influential. Other actors in this network included the WWF (World Wide Fund for Nature, originally World Wildlife Fund) and UNESCO. A second network, closely intertwined with the first one, consisted of a transnational community of scientists, with E. O. Wilson acting as primus inter pares. This network developed the conceptual framework of biodiversity as understood in the CBD (Wilson 1989, 1992; Wilson and Peter 1988). Referring to its dominant disciplinary orientation, we might characterize it as the conservation biology network (Soulé 1985). Many of its experts took part in the negotiations, and their consensus provided a base on which political decision-makers could take the issue further (Suplie 1995, 43). Organizations concerned with genetic resources formed a third network that contributed to the CBD. This network comprised organizations and groups engaged in the conservation and provision of germplasm for agriculture, such as seed banks. At the UN level, this network was represented by the FAO (Suplie 1995). Furthermore, commercial plant breeders, pharmaceutical companies, and other biotechnology corporations were loosely linked to this genetic resource network (Swanson 1997). In the negotiations within the Intergovernmental Committee for a Convention on Biological Diversity preceding the Rio Summit in 1992, the most vigorous debates took place between industrialized and developing countries. In a nutshell, the argument reflected a collision of interests: the industrial countries controlled financial and technological resources and sought control over biodiversity for reasons of nature conservation and biotechnology, respectively, while developing countries had sovereignty over biodiversity and sought access to finances and technology (Suplie 1995). The differences in the interests of the three networks of actors as well as between the developed and developing countries respectively are reflected in the tensions and ambiguities that characterize the CBD. Time and again these tensions and ambiguities have materialized in problems of practical biodiversity management as well as in efforts to deliberatively solve these problems. They relate to at least three issues: .

.

Tensions between the goals of nature protection and sustainable use. In introducing the concept of biodiversity, its advocates aimed to forge a link between the protection of nature and the sustainable use of genetic diversity as a “largely untapped reservoir of new foods, pharmaceuticals, fibers, petroleum substitutes, and other products” (Wilson 1988, vi). In concrete situations, however, there are often serious tradeoffs between a strict protection of nature and local access to and use of natural resources (see, e.g. McShane et al. 2011). Biodiversity policy is more often targeted to the former than the latter. The concept of biodiversity can help to open up the debate for sustainable resource use, but it may also conceal and obscure trade-offs in environmental protection. Tensions between science and ethics. The CBD introduced biodiversity as a scientific concept. As such, many environmentalists and government officials appreciated it as a more objective and evidence-based approach than traditional nature conservation (see, e.g. for the Netherlands, Rientjes 1999). At the same time, however, biodiversity clearly constitutes a normative concept, primarily based on values cherished by Northern environmentalists. This is explicitly expressed in the preamble of the CBD, which refers to the “intrinsic value of biological diversity and (…)


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the ecological, genetic, social, economic, scientific, educational, cultural, recreational and aesthetic values of biological diversity and its components.” Nonetheless, many debates on biodiversity highlight the scientific character of the concept centered on genetic diversity and fail to sufficiently acknowledge its normative character, for instance, when biodiversity management is described as an effort “to place biologically determined priorities within an appropriate socio-political framework” (Vane-Wright 1996, 333). Tensions between global North and South. Enmeshed in the two previous aspects, the relationship between North and South constitutes a further source of tensions and ambiguities in the CBD. While the developed countries call for the global protection of nature and access to genetic resources, the developing countries demand a larger share of the benefits from natural resources and access to biotechnology. The CBD clearly comprises the aim of fairly and equitably sharing the benefits that derive from genetic resources. More specifically, the developing countries should receive their fair share of the benefits generated by biotechnologies in proportion to the genetic resources they provide. Furthermore, many authors on biodiversity management stress the need for compensating local communities that are confronted with restrictions related to environmental protection (see, e.g. Swanson 1997). In reality, however, little has been accomplished in terms of sharing and compensation. In applying the concepts of biodiversity management, it is therefore vital to acknowledge the broad spectrum of diverging options in linking biodiversity conservation with, for example, poverty reduction (Adams et al. 2004).

2.2. Unpacking the ambiguities of the CBD’s concept of biodiversity Even though the process of creating the CBD reproduced some of the structural conditions and inherent tensions of global policy, it also laid the conceptual foundations for understanding the issues of species loss, ecosystem degradation, and related problems. Article 2 defines biological diversity as “variability among living organisms of all sources (…) and the ecological complex of which they are a part; it includes diversity within species, between species and of ecosystems.” Note that, according to this definition, biodiversity is not defined as a set of entities but rather as diversity among different entities, that is, as a disposition. Thus, epistemologically, one can ask in which form biodiversity exists as well as, ethically, why we should conserve a disposition (rather than entities). It is disputable whether it is appropriate to attribute “intrinsic value” to the concept of variability at all. According to the CBD definition, biodiversity encompasses three broad layers: . .

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Diversity within species refers to genetic variability. Epistemologically, it points to “genetic conservation” as a special field within conservation biology. Diversity between species points to the concept of species. The biological sciences know several different concepts thereof. Among other issues, the choice of concept affects the resulting extinction rates as well as the degrees of endangerment of the respective species. Diversity of ecosystems raises epistemological issues regarding the concept of “ecosystems.” To some scholars, ecosystems are real units of the natural world (synonym: “bio-geo-coenosis”). Most scholars, however, adopt a more constructivist approach, arguing that ecosystems are more or less arbitrarily defined by ecologists according to research interests. From this perspective, ecosystems are the set

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J. Jetzkowitz et al. of relations that ecologists are interested in. In a constructivist approach, there is an innumerable quantity of ecosystems.

To sum up, the concept of biodiversity and its three layers raise important epistemological questions. In addition to these three layers of biodiversity, the CBD also postulates three main objectives. According to Article 1, they encompass “the conservation of biodiversity, the sustainable use of its components, and the fair access and equitable sharing of the benefits arising out of the utilization of genetic resources.” Note that the third objective refers to genetic diversity only. This restriction of ABS to genes is a product of the political debate on “biopiracy.” In principle, however, there is no reason to restrict ABS to one layer of biodiversity only. Rather, the ABS objective can and should be applied to all three layers (and sub-layers) of biodiversity. Combining the three layers and the three objectives yields a conceptual scheme (Table 1) that provides orientation regarding the “locus” of specific debates on biodiversity. It makes a difference whether the issue at stake entails the conservation of diversity within or between species or of ecosystems (see the first column of the matrix). Similarly, it makes a difference whether we discuss conservation or sustainable use of diversity or whether it is fair access to and the sharing of benefits derived from the utilization of species diversity that we are aiming at (see the middle row of the matrix). Finally, it makes a difference whether the issue at stake concerns fair access to and the sharing of benefits from genetic diversity (see top-right corner of the matrix) or the conservation of ecosystem diversity (see bottom-left corner of the matrix). Besides structuring different aspects of the biodiversity discourse, the matrix offers two further insights. First, the top row of the matrix lists the three objectives of the CBD. Such objectives aim at governing behavior – they are goals that society and its members (should) strive to achieve. As such, they are not descriptive but normative. Accordingly, all nine cells of the matrix are of a hybrid nature – they concern both scientific as well as normative issues. Second, the generic examples (e.g. conservation versus sustainable use of species diversity) already show that the concept of biodiversity employed in the CBD contains tensions between different objectives (such as nature conservation on the one hand and the use of natural resources on the other). These potentially conflicting objectives are integrated in the concept of biodiversity by defining it in a broad way. Yet this by no means solves these conflicts. The CBD as such is silent on how its three general objectives (i) might be understood in detail, (ii) how they might be justified ethically, and (iii) how they might be realized on different political scales and at different locations. Nevertheless, it is obvious that

Table 1. A matrix for deliberation. Conservation Diversity within species, genes, populations Diversity between species Diversity of ecosystems, landscapes, biomes

Sustainable use

Fair and equitable sharing of benefits


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Table 2. The differences between the natural sciences, the social sciences, and ethics – an overview.

Method

Natural sciences Social sciences Description (cause – effect)

Subject area (“Gegenstandsbereich”)

Natural phenomena

Social phenomena Practices, motives, desires, emotions, goals, norms, values, habits, beliefs, etc.

Ethics Justification (of validity) Norms and values

clarifying these objectives requires knowledge of the social sciences, humanities, and ethics. Along with other social phenomena, objectives, or goals constitute part of the subject area of the social sciences (see Table 2). Therefore, understanding objectives (i) requires social scientific expertise. Similarly, substantiating and justifying objectives (ii) is a task for ethics (see Table 2). Finally, developing ideas on how to realize the objectives (iii) once again requires social scientific insights, both in terms of understanding the drivers of biodiversity loss and in terms of identifying possibilities for establishing different practices in complex socio-ecological systems. 3. Methodological reflections: how the social sciences and ethics can address the issue of biodiversity The importance of including the social sciences and ethics in knowledge production to solve environmental problems and manage the ecological crisis and the need to develop interdisciplinary approaches have been voiced for some time now, both in research calls and in environmental expert bodies such as the IPBES and IPCC. Yet this is often more words than deeds (see, e.g. Lövbrand et al. 2015). Furthermore, interdisciplinary collaboration is much easier claimed than put it into practice. One reason for this consists in the fact that invitations for collaboration often do not reflect on the different character of disciplines and research traditions (which has even been conceived of in terms of different scientific cultures, see Snow [1959] 2001). It is worth noting that all sciences should be considered as both an epistemological enterprise and a social system. Irrespective of being a natural science or social science, sciences are characterized by a number of similarities, not least that their main target is to explain a particular domain of reality, its specific subject area, by systematically investigating it through established methods. In its social dimension, science can be defined as a system – composed of institutions, organizations, roles, and norms – that is assigned with the function of generating new knowledge (see Parsons and Platt 1973). Besides these commonalities, it is also important to acknowledge the differences between various scientific disciplines so as to avoid misunderstandings, develop reasonable expectations, and establish fruitful collaboration. Table 2 provides an overview of some important differences between the natural sciences, the social sciences, and ethics. The differences are painted in broad strokes to give a general orientation.3 What the natural and social sciences have in common is that their knowledge production is guided by the normative idea of objective truth (see Habermas 2003; Luhmann 1994). While ethics devotes itself to the challenging task of substantiating norms and guidelines for future action, the natural and social sciences both seek to make statements on research objects that are accessible to concrete experience. The

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crucial difference between natural science and social science is the different character of their research objects. The natural sciences examine natural phenomena.4 Their research objects comprise things such as atoms, species, or ecosystems (that is, objects in the everyday sense of the word). Social scientists examine social phenomena. Their research objects encompass individuals, groups, organizations, societies, and cultures (that is, people or subjects and what goes on between them as opposed to the research objects of the natural sciences). Accordingly, social scientists explore a reality (i.e. social reality) that has already been interpreted by their research objects and cannot be comprehended without considering these interpretations, which invariably affect the reality in question. The basis for this difference can be attributed to the human disposition for sensemaking. We navigate our way through the world by way of attributing meaning to it. We label humans, animals, plants, and all kinds of other things, including events and artifacts; we describe them, perhaps sort them into larger groups based on similarities, or distinguish them according to criteria of dissimilarity, and in so doing, organize what we know or that of which we have at least some idea. This sensemaking does not take place in a social vacuum but in close interaction with others. Through socialization, people appropriate a specific way of understanding the world, which makes it possible to act in this world and shape knowledge about it (see Berger and Luckmann 1966; Stehr 1994). However, this sensemaking is not limited to individuals and groups alone but is a process that also takes place in organized social structures of any kind (see Weick, Sutcliffe, and Obstfeld 2009). All acting units, including movements, companies, and interest organizations, develop an understanding of the world that is internally plausible and coherent and which guides their actions. The above-mentioned difference between natural and social science has often been conceptualized in terms of a difference between simple hermeneutics and double hermeneutics: science constitutes a social enterprise executed by actors who assign meaning to what they do and what they discover. Both natural and social scientists have to consider the meaning created within the scientific community (simple hermeneutics). In addition, however, social scientists have to consider the meaning created by those whom they investigate, that is to say, the meaning created by their research objects (double hermeneutics, see Giddens 1993). All scientific statements on cause-and-effect relationships have to be assessed against the conditions of truth in order evaluate the validity of a particular statement. However, due to the different character of the natural and the social sciences, these statements must be assessed against different conditions of truth (Foucault 1970; van Koppen 2017). Through different methods – among which the experiment is the most well-known – the natural sciences test hypotheses towards an external material world.5 A causal effect of X on Y can, for example, be investigated on the basis of a hypothesis and under conditions ensuring maximum control of these variables and particularly of other (or outside) influences. The data obtained in this process take the form of measured values with varying reliability ranges and fluctuations in time, that are analyzed by statistical methods. For the social sciences, however, this way of evaluating the validity of their statements is rarely sufficient. Social scientific statements have to prove their worth in the light of people’s everyday experiences and common sense. This does not mean that, in making their statements, social scientists must cater to the prescientific, unreflected beliefs that a society takes for granted. What it means is that, in the social sciences, it is not sufficient to establish a causal link between X and Y to qualify it as a relevant statement. To explain societal conditions and developments, the social sciences must also investigate the reason behind such a causal link; for instance, why a particular activity has emerged


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and which function it serves for those actors who engage in it. Therefore, social scientists need to include motives, meanings, emotions, objectives, and the like in their explanations. Only if they do so, are they able to comprehensibly and accurately explain social phenomena (see Schütz 1962, 1966; Weber 1980). This distinctive feature of the criteria of relevance applying to the explanations provided by the social sciences is of great significance in addressing the issues raised by biodiversity. Social science asks about the causes and drivers of environmental problems. Without any knowledge about these social causes and drivers, it is not possible to find viable solutions. To give an example, attributing changes in the biological diversity of plant species to, for instance, economic success measured by GDP or average household income (see Essl et al. 2011; Grove et al. 2006; Hope et al. 2003) is not an acceptable explanation from a social science perspective, as we cannot derive the reasons for actions potentially affecting biological diversity from a set of stochastically fluctuating values (Jetzkowitz and Schneider 2011). In other words, this explanation does not tell us why economic success measured in these terms correlates with changes in biological diversity. Furthermore, an explanation of this kind does not consider the differentiated and heterogeneous nature of society. It is never an abstract humanity that has an adverse impact on biological diversity. Rather, it is always particular actors that cause such impact. Finally, it is impossible to investigate society without being aware of and referring to the norms and values of the time, either reaffirming or rejecting them, and thus taking a stance as a member of that society (Bourdieu et al. 1999; Habermas 1988). Even though the perspectives of the social sciences and ethics are interwoven in this respect, the social scientific methods of investigating the regularities and inherent patterns that define a society are not suited to assess, let alone substantiate, the general validity of norms, values, and recommendations for action. 4. What can social sciences and ethics contribute to discourse on biodiversity? 4.1. The necessity to interpret and evaluate different voices The discourse on biodiversity in general and the CBD in particular both reflect that the process of modernization has dramatically enhanced society’s capacity to shape its environment. This capacity has been closely associated with modern society’s self-conception as a progressive endeavor of liberating itself from previously existing restrictions (see, e.g. Parsons 1982). However, this process has not only involved a tremendous increase in material wealth but has also resulted in widespread environmental destruction such as the extinction of a multitude of animal and plant species. Furthermore, humans have also deliberately (or sometimes inadvertently) changed the composition of species. The introduction and subsequent spread of the cane toad in the Caribbean and Pacific regions (see Easteal 1981; Lever 2001), of the European rabbit to Australia (see Coman 2010), or of the North American raccoon to Central Europe (see Fischer et al. 2015) are among the prominent cases in point. In addition, modern society is characterized by its heterogeneity and internal complexity. Due to social differentiation, societal institutions and activities are increasingly specialized. An implication of such differentiation is that it harbors different (and partly conflictual) interests, values, and views of what is worth striving for. To return to one of the examples mentioned above, not all inhabitants of the Caribbean and Pacific regions were interested in introducing the cane toad; it was mainly the owners of sugar cane plantations who had a motive and the power to do so.

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Furthermore, different segments of society evaluate and interpret phenomena differently. There is not only a debate about the value of biodiversity (compared to other societal objectives) but also about its meaning. Thus, to the extent that the call for “biodiversity” prevails over conflicting goals and is thus heard and answered at all (as in the CBD), it is usually answered by different voices and different actions (see Table 1). Explaining these different interpretations once again requires social scientific expertise. Conflicting goals reveal the necessity for ethics and deliberation. When actors have to prioritize and when positive goals are not easy to harmonize, there is a need to discuss and justify how priorities are to be set. 4.2.

The contribution of social sciences – two examples

A social science perspective can address in a methodologically sound manner how real people’s dispositions to act in certain ways form in relation to the web of societal conditions and specific biophysical structures in which they are embedded. Two examples shall serve to illustrate that knowledge regarding such relationships not only contributes to a general understanding of the interrelations between nature and society but may also help us to deepen specific risk assessments (Example 1) or assess the effects of policies (Example 2). Example 1: What is to be gained by incorporating social scientific knowledge in risk assessment can be demonstrated by taking a closer look at current debates in the EU over the herbicide glyphosate. The use of herbicides is highly relevant to the discourse on biodiversity, not least because it is interlinked with pesticide use and genetically modified crops that are tolerant of herbicides as discussed in the IPBES report on pollinators, pollination, and food production. In Europe, glyphosate is used in agri- and horticulture, in manufacturing, and in the maintenance of public spaces and private yards and gardens. The previous EU approval expired on 31 December 2015, which then required the review of the earlier health-risk assessment. The institution in charge, the German Federal Institute for Risk Assessment (Bundesanstalt für Risikobewertung, BfR), had completed its review in 2013. It had concluded that available scientific data did not provide reliable evidence of glyphosate being carcinogenic, mutagenic, or embryotoxic. However, in March 2015, the World Health Organization’s International Agency for Research on Cancer classified glyphosate as “probably carcinogenic to humans.” Together with other controversial studies and case reports on the toxicity of the agent, this statement drew wide public attention to the EU approval process. In reaction to this, the director of the BfR emphasized that “based on current scientific knowledge, there is no reason to expect that glyphosate poses a cancer risk to humans when used properly and according to regulations and label directions” (Hensel 2015, emphasis by the authors). It is striking that knowledge of the actual use of glyphosate or other pesticides was not taken into consideration in assessing their risks to the public. The BfR risk assessment did not build on investigating and analyzing the real-life practices of glyphosate users. Rather, it was based on strong moral assumptions that take for granted “proper use according to regulations and label directions.” Researchers who talk with farmers, for instance, know that the latter use a glyphosate-containing product such as Roundup in combination with other plant-protection and growthstimulating agents, which then can lead to combined effects. In assessing the toxicity of agents, and thus also the effects they might have on biodiversity, it would be crucial to know whether there are different practices in using pesticides and, if so, how they differ


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and how these patterns relate to the specific organizational structures of, for instance, agricultural production or the maintenance of public spaces. Example 2: The fact that ignorance of societal conditions can become an obstacle to biodiversity management is demonstrated by efforts to ensure the functioning of the Masai Mara National Reserve in southern Kenya (which protects the northern part of the Serengeti). During the 1990s, changes in ground cover and a decline in the wildebeest population were observed in this region. They were attributed to a significant influx of Masai migrants from the north and to increasingly market-oriented forms of land use in the buffer zones adjacent to the core zone of the game reserve (Homewood et al. 2001). The influx of Masai migrants was not least sparked by the gradual privatization and partitioning of the Masai communal land. This process started in the 1980s and was supported by the World Bank’s Structural Adjustment Program (Kang’ara 1999). At the beginning of the 2000s, the policy of privatization was also implemented on the land adjacent to the national reserve. This land was distributed among 65,000 private land holdings and, from 2005 onward, leased to investors from the tourist industry to establish nature tourism reserves under private ownership. Fencing off land came into fashion. The Masai shepherds increasingly went to pasture their herds within the national park as the private reserves were well protected. This points back to conservation and sustainable use as two potentially conflicting objectives subsumed under the notion of biodiversity as conceived in the CBD. Both examples show that taking socio-cultural dimensions into account is indispensable in the quest to develop appropriate answers to the issue of biodiversity (for other cases, see Gilbert, Hulst, and Rientjes 2006). Since the problems related thereto are predominantly caused by societal factors, these have to be considered in a systematic and methodical manner by social scientists. If, as pointed out above, we need to reconstruct the relevant actors’ perspectives on their life situations, we must delve into their different socio-cultural realities. This requires applying the appropriate social science methods to systematically collect data pertaining to these realities – for instance, in the form of minutes, field notes, and other types of documentation – and subsequently analyzing these data. The decision on how and what data are gathered ultimately depends on the research question (Punch 2005). Data collection and analysis are assessed against the quality standards of research. What social scientists share with their natural science counterparts is that both can make mistakes (see Section 5) – yet this does not reduce the value of social scientific analysis per se.

4.3.

The contribution of ethics – two examples

Ethics deals with the analysis, explication, and justification of norms and values. As an academic discipline it employs scientific criteria to distinguish convincing from less convincing arguments and in doing so, aims at an impartial perspective. Environmental ethics is a branch of applied ethics, which performs this task with respect to human–nature relations. Its contribution to biodiversity discourse thus primarily consists in offering arguments that reason why the (different) objectives connected to biodiversity should be pursued. To illustrate the argument, ethics can demonstrate that a particular conception of sustainability involves claims calling for justice towards contemporary and future generations. On the basis of a natural-scientific account that natural capital performs multiple functions for human well-being, one can argue in favor of strong sustainability.6 Strong sustainability claims that we need to maintain constant natural capital (Ott and Döring 2008).

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However, the so-called Constant Natural Capital Rule (CNCR) does not imply the need to conserve all forms of biodiversity since some species do not contribute to human welfare but impair it. Bacteria that cause diseases and pests that destroy yields are not protected by the CNCR. By contrast, a holistic perspective according to which all natural entities have intrinsic moral value (e.g. Gorke 2003) requires conserving biodiversity of all kinds. In this perspective, conservation would apply even to highly pathological bacteria and viruses. The ongoing dispute among ethicists about which entities do (not) feature intrinsic moral value does not imply that ethics is arbitrary. Rather, from a discourse-ethical perspective, ethicists contribute to specific discourses by means of arguing for or against specific claims. Discourses may last for decades or even centuries and form complex patterns of reasoning (see Section 5). Nevertheless, developing such complex arguments and presenting them for discourse in an accessible manner can constructively contribute towards solving problems of environmental governance. On another, more concrete note, the IPBES conceptual framework (see Díaz et al. 2015; Löfmarck and Lidskog 2017) distinguishes between different categories, which it assigns to different knowledge systems.7 The main differences between the three categories are presented in Table 3. This conceptual framework explains the differences between these categories as being rooted in different knowledge systems, which means that they are the product of different interpretations and evaluations. Insofar as these different conceptions are linked to different interpretations, their explanation constitutes a task for the social sciences. Insofar as they are linked to different evaluations, their explication and justification constitutes a task for ethics. Given such differences in perspective, the question of how to conceptualize human well-being has preoccupied philosophers since ancient times. Recent contributions in environmental virtue ethics claim that living in harmony with nature might be part of some specific set of environmental virtues (Sandler 2005). Furthermore, there exist numerous contributions that have criticized the reduction of nature’s benefits to people to a purely instrumental perspective (e.g. Chan, Satterfield, and Goldstein 2012). Both statements are not meant to negate that the so-called other knowledge systems are independent or to imply that they could be dissolved into ethics as part of the Western knowledge system. Rather, we wish to indicate that ethics can offer terminological instruments to engage with other knowledge systems and discuss the different evaluations on which they are based. That is to say, one way in which ethics can contribute to biodiversity discourse is by disclosing value judgements and thus making them accessible to discourse.

Table 3. Elements of the IPBES conceptual framework as stemming from different knowledge systems. General, highly inclusive category Good quality of life

Dominant interpretation in scientific discourses Human well-being

Nature’s benefits to people Nature

Ecosystem goods and services Biodiversity and ecosystems

Examples of interpretations in other knowledge systems Living in harmony with nature Living well and in balance with Mother Earth Nature’s gifts Mother Earth Web of life Creation


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5. The problem-solving capacity of deliberation on biological diversity So far we have argued that the social sciences can contribute to explaining how (societal) threats to biodiversity arise and how they might be solved. Furthermore, ethics can contribute by disclosing (implicit) value judgements and providing proposals as to which of the objectives provided in Table 1 should be pursued in which area. As such, both the social sciences and ethics offer valuable contributions to the scientific discourse on biodiversity. Since the threats to biodiversity arise from societal processes, addressing these threats can only proceed as a societal process as well. To put it bluntly, biodiversity conservation will always affect people. This being the case, we assert that governing biodiversity requires participative deliberation. In the following, we will first underpin this assertion and then provide some considerations on the design of deliberative processes.

5.1.

Rationale for deliberation – ethical considerations

Whenever we debate over a topic and determine focal points, language is inescapable (Hönigswald 1937). To determine something without the use of language is impossible. This means that the practice of speaking has to be considered thoroughly as the starting point of deliberative activities. Questions, denial, doubt, and criticism are specific modes of speech acts. Such modes are performed by actors saying “I” and “you” interchangeably, saying “yes” or “no” to each other’s validity claims, and presenting reasons “pro” or “con” such claims. “I–you,” “yes–no,” and “pro–con” are the definable constituents of discourse and deliberation that represent the reciprocity of speech. Moreover, arguing invariably implies some degree of commitment to the rules of discourse, as Habermas (2015) argued. A matter at stake such as “biodiversity” becomes a “universe of discourse” as people deliberate, according to the rules of discourse, within the structural matrix outlined in Table 1.8 Before specifying deliberation over biodiversity, some general remarks are in order. As stated above, we navigate our way through the world in which we live by attributing meaning. This holds for science as it does for everyday life in general. As a lingual activity, science can be seen as a special way of determining entities by means of language (Ott 1997). Since epistemic discourse is the everyday business of science, it is part of the scientific habitus to exchange arguments, engage in discussions, and make informed choices on this basis. The professional practice of “doing science” includes discursive cooperation in formulating research findings, which can be a rather positive experience indeed (see, e.g. Norgaard 2007). However, the problems tackled in inter- and transdisciplinary discourses on sustainable development could not be managed or solved without deliberation and lay participation (Ziegler and Ott 2012). This also holds for deliberation on the issue of biodiversity. Therefore, we must take a closer look at the differences between scientific experts and lay people as they are crucial to our further considerations. Any epistemic community is confronted with the knowledge of lay people, which draws primarily on cultural common sense. There are many non-scientific ways to name, group, sort, and value natural entities and many cultural (and “indigenous”) knowledge systems by which to refer to the entities that fall under the Western concept of “biodiversity” (see Table 3). Attempts to integrate these knowledge systems in deliberative processes that are geared towards decision-making transform the lay person’s role from an observer to a participant.9 Participants are members of a specific community of inquiry and deliberation, and their general commitment to the rules of specific discourses should be taken into consideration as the constitutive core of discourse ethics (Habermas 1981; Ott 2008).

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In political philosophy, discourse ethics has been specified in terms of concepts of deliberative democracy (Habermas 1996; Ott 2014). Concepts of deliberative decisionmaking have been developed at various political levels and with reference to various theoretical frameworks (see, e.g. Dryzek 2010; Elster 1998; Parkinson and Mansbridge 2012). As opposed to styles of governance that ensure norm compliance by employing political power or economic incentives, deliberative politics relies on involving the members of a society who will be affected by the norms in the setting of these norms. A deliberative arrangement of this kind does not intend for a supposedly neutral scientific or expert opinion to determine the subject matter of such deliberations in advance. The underlying assumption is that there is a relationship between the compliance with norms and their claim to validity. Pragmatically, to agree on a rule implies the personal willingness to comply and follow the rule. The members of a society are motivated to comply with a norm when they have reason to do so. And they will be more likely to have reason to do so when they also have a say in the process of setting the norm in question. In a nutshell, all people affected should (be able to) participate. As mentioned above, the rules of discourse can be derived from the reciprocity of speech. However, this of course does not mean that each speaker will always abide by them. Accordingly, deliberation requires institutionalized provisions to enforce rules so as to ensure that each participant will be heard. For the rules of discourse to be impartial against individual speakers, they need to be observed by all parties because they contribute to and safeguard the fairness of the process. Specific deliberations may bring about specific commitments that supplement the formal rules of discourse. Biodiversity deliberations are committed to the stock of focal topics that defines some degree of focal unity and are informed by some general lines of reasoning in environmental ethics as to why biodiversity should be protected (Ott 2015). These lines of reasoning often do not result in a strong obligation to protect any single component of biodiversity strictly, but rather provide prima-facie reasons not to impair biodiversity without sound reasons. This result might be disappointing to some conservationists but would seem stringent from an ES perspective (see Section 4.3). Specific discourses originate in specific cultures and historical periods. As they emerge over time, they transcend their particular context of origin and spread beyond. The discourse on biodiversity is a recent paradigmatic case of such “internal widening” (Habermas). Discourses also become independent of their initial proponents (e.g. E. O. Wilson in the case of biodiversity). The longer they last, the more they are determined by established patterns of reasoning and by conceptual schemes, models, standards, and so forth. Finally, we should stress that deliberation has to occur at different locations within a multi-layered system of epistemic communities and political governance structures. While the CBD and IPBES operate on a global scale, particular locations also matter. There are many national strategies on biodiversity, which must be conceived in terms of the interplay between civil society, committed advocates and NGOs, state administrations, boards of political advisors, governments, and international regimes such as CBD. Such deliberation on strategies could be reconstructed within a framework of deliberative democracy (Habermas 1996) and could be made the object of empirical social scientific research. In modern societies with mature liberal democracies, a complex structure of institutions and spheres has evolved that enables, stimulates, and promotes political deliberation (Habermas 1996). It is essential to consider that different agents and structural entities fulfill different but necessary tasks and roles in this complex structure (see, e.g. Parsons 1969). Broadly speaking, the political sphere consists of a professionalized core, which


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includes parliaments, governments, administrations, supreme courts, and party headquarters. This is where law making takes place and is controlled. Surrounding this core, there is an extended political sphere occupied by civil society, whose members (citizens) take interest in and reason about political affairs. Civil society organizes itself in NGOs, grassroots movements, single-issue initiatives, demonstrations, and even collective forms of civil disobedience. Civil society attempts to set political agendas and influence politics. Between the professionalized core and the more informal sphere of civil society, there are different intermediate agencies that serve as interfaces and hubs. Here we find state agencies (such as the EPA in the US), offices of technology assessment, scientific policy-advisory councils (such as WGBU and SRU in Germany), research centers and academies, large funding agencies and trusts, headquarters of NGOs, and the like. The National Biodiversity Strategy of Germany, first launched in 2007, has, for instance, largely been devised and planned within this intermediate zone. These intermediate zones are underrated locations for deliberations within which scientists, NGO representatives, administrators, clerks, business people, and others meet. This complex and dynamic intermediate zone can and should be researched in detail by sociology and political science (see, e.g. Nicolaus 2016; Nicolaus and Jetzkowitz 2014), but it can also be taken as evidence that environmental deliberative democracy is not a utopia (Ott 2014). Interestingly, a similar structure seems to be emerging at the international level of environmental regime formation. A multitude of NGOs as well as nature conservation agencies (IUCN) and trusts constitute a global public sphere on the sidelines while nation states negotiate international environmental regimes (such as UNFCCC, CITES, CBD, the Ramsar Convention, some parts of the Convention of the High Seas, Antarctica Convention). They act on the basis of both common ground and particularistic interests. Globalized epistemic communities (such as the IPCC and IPBES) are essential parts of the intermediate zones of this structure – nodes in networks of deliberation that program and plan ways by which well-justified goals might be reached. From such a discourseethical perspective, it is no wonder that the IPBES must reflect on different conceptual schemes and “worldviews” if it is to contribute to political governance issues. 5.2.

Deliberation in practice – social sciences’ reflections

The imperative that a deliberative approach to biodiversity management must include the perspectives not just of scientific experts but also of lay people is already well established (see Callon and Rabeharisoa 2008; Faucheux and Hue 2001; Fish 2011). This begs the question of what this means in practice and how a concept such as fair ABS can help ensure that a wider set of stakeholder values, a broader knowledge base, and a greater variety of needs and priorities are considered in decision-making processes. This is a complex process. As Fish (2011) notes in the context of an ecosystems services approach to environmental decision-making, important questions about who it is that social and natural scientists should be working with and what kind of evidence they should be looking for remains contested. Further inquiry and debate are also needed to clarify how data about ecosystems or biodiversity should be translated into information that can be communicated to the public and how and why formal (such as results from participative processes) and informal (such as reactions by members of the public) reactions to such information should be valued in decision-making, respectively. Furthermore, it is not practical for all members of the public to be involved in every decision-making process. The question therefore is how to determine when, how, and through which means how much public participation should be incorporated (Esguerra, Beck, and Lidskog 2017).

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Here, it is worth reflecting on what specific functions deliberation should serve in the context of environmental and biodiversity management. First, deliberation enables a more robust knowledge base to be established. Renn (2014) distinguishes three categories of knowledge: (1) knowledge for orientation, which requires value input from all affected populations, (2) knowledge for system understanding, which requires input from those who are able to contribute to the analysis of the risks and opportunities that come with each decision option, and (3) knowledge for transformation, which requires input by all who are needed to translate insights into collective action. This provides some direction in regard to who should be involved in what type of decision: depending on the issue to be decided, different types of knowledge need to be developed, which require the involvement of different sets of stakeholders (natural scientists, social scientists, activists, civil society representatives, community leaders, and so on). Second, deliberation helps to deal with uncertainties that the scientific discourse is not able to resolve. Van der Sluijs (2012, 186–187), for example, identified three strategies of dealing with uncertainties at the science–policy interface: (1) uncertainty as imperfections in the knowledge, numerically expressed in ranges of confidence (“truth with error bars”); (2) uncertainty as a lack of unequivocalness, overcome by negotiated agreement of peers (“consensus as a proxy for truth”); and (3) uncertainty and dissent as facts of life to be worked with (“joint exploration of uncertainties and ignorance”). Deliberation can help clarify imperfections in knowledge, deal with lack of consensus, and jointly explore the boundaries between knowledge and ignorance (see, e.g. Gross 2016). Indeed, the contrary tendency among natural scientists to omit uncertainties at the science–policy communication interface has, on numerous occasions, been detrimental to public trust not just in individual scientists and their “truth claims” but also in their disciplines and institutions (see Kasperson and Kasperson 2005; Lockie and Wong 2017; Wynne 1996). This brings us to the third associated function of deliberation in establishing legitimacy for and the acceptability of the decisions made, especially among those most likely to be affected by them. This often requires difficult trade-offs to be made by a diverse set of stakeholders. Deliberation provides the setting and platform to facilitate this process of priority setting by determining which values (social, ecological, or economic) are more important/urgent than others, what objects (species, genes, populations, ecosystems, landscapes, or biomes) require more immediate attention, protection, and so on, and what connections, linkages, and interdependencies exist between these two domains. These are decisions that cannot be made by scientists alone. The question that necessarily follows is how deliberation could be implemented in practice. A range of participatory techniques and frameworks have been developed among the ranks of the risk-governance and social-impact-assessment scholarship since the 1980s (see Dryzek and Niemeyer 2008; Vanclay and Esteves 2011) that has aimed at facilitating deliberation and assessing, or estimating in advance, the social consequences likely to arise from specific policies and ventures such as resource development, largescale construction projects, and similar endeavors (Lockie 2007, 787). These frameworks can nevertheless be easily applied to biodiversity management. The “stakeholder involvement escalator,” formulated by Renn (2008) and colleagues, for example, distinguishes four types of risk problems as a starting point for deciding who should be involved in what type of deliberation. Such problems can be (1) linear, (2) complex, (3) highly uncertain, and (4) highly ambiguous. The type of risk problem indicates the level of stakeholder involvement needed, ranging from largely expert involvement in dealing with linear risks, to extensive involvement of (technical and social)


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scientists, affected public stakeholders, and civil society in addressing highly uncertain and ambiguous risk problems. Following the same logics of public participation, but more focused on deliberation at the level of project planning and implementation, Wong (2015) proposed a “hybrid risk governance framework” composed of five stages of co-selection, co-design, co-definition, co-planning, and co-regulation. Each stage is guided by a set of deliberative questions and selection criteria for participation, with an avenue to return to earlier stages of deliberation when disagreement or conflict arises in order to reevaluate and renegotiate the set of interests and priorities. Importantly, this framework pays special attention to including values of nature in the co-definition stage of deliberation and gives natural, social, and human capital equal importance in the co-planning stage of deliberation. Depending on the type of problem and the degree of preexisting adversarial elements among involved stakeholders, both frameworks deploy different types of participatory formats: expert hearings, consensus conferences, the Delphi process, roundtables, valuetree analysis, stakeholder hearings, citizen juries, and focus groups (Renn 2015). Both approaches seek to offer a set of practical rules of procedure and a range of relevant formats for organizing the deliberative process. The objective here is to enable stakeholders to deliberate on priorities and acceptable trade-offs that form the basis of fair and acceptable decision outcomes (i.e. ABS). Importantly, both approaches see public stakeholders not only as valuable sources of knowledge but also as important agents for disseminating the results of the governance process and facilitating outreach (Renn 2015, 8). The inclusion of lay people in the process of knowledge/data production is therefore not accidental to the biodiversity discourse or just “nice to have,” but deeply pragmatic. It is a matter of producing better science and more robust decisions through societal learning, controlled integration of values into analytical decisions, and improved quality of technical assessment processes through lay questioning and challenging of expert assumptions. Procedural fairness embedded in deliberative processes also increases public trust and confidence in decisions and decision-makers (Hartz-Karp and Pope 2011, 254). Instances of successful integration of lay knowledge and public participation in decision-making, policy formulation and implementation can be found in a range of different policy domains, from local nature conservation projects (e.g. Baranek and Günther 2005) and global citizen deliberation on biodiversity (see Rask and Worthington 2015), to nuclear waste management in Sweden (Elam and Sundqvist 2009, 2011), “participative foresight” in science, technology, and environmental policy in the US and continental Europe (O’Faircheallaigh 2009), to the French Association of patients suffering from muscular dystrophies changing the course of medical research on neuromuscular disease (Callon and Rabeharisoa 2008). These examples are not exhaustive, but they sufficiently show that public involvement and deliberation on matters of scientific and policy concern is possible. Ultimately, if affected stakeholders feel vested in the decisions made on the basis of sound reasons, they are less likely to resist policies, programs, plans, and so forth and are more likely to take ownership and participate actively on their own account. 6.

Concluding remarks

In this paper, we have shown that the belief that biodiversity can be studied without reference to socially constructed, evaluative, or indeed normative contexts is patently wrong. We have emphasized that the term “biodiversity” was actually originally introduced to draw attention to the impending loss of something highly valuable in the biophysical

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structures that even modern, globalized societies are embedded in. Subsequently, we have demonstrated that, why, and how the contents of the CBD are actually characterized by tensions and ambiguities. Nevertheless, we have argued that, even though the CBD’s contents are shaped by its contingent, historical development process, combining the three objectives of the convention with the distinction of diversity within and between species as well as the diversity of ecosystems provides a useful framework for structuring biodiversity discourse. Among other things, the matrix we have used to illustrate this shows that biodiversity discourse is seldom purely descriptive but usually suffused with aims, goals, and objectives. Biodiversity thus constitutes a hybrid concept (Potthast 2007). Against this background, we have argued that understanding and realizing objectives necessitates social scientific expertise while substantiating objectives requires ethics (Section 2). This need for interdisciplinary collaboration is often claimed yet seldom successfully realized. Although not a new insight by far, one reason for this consists in the continuing lack of knowledge and understanding of the different scientific cultures. To address this issue, we have provided some methodological considerations on the commonalities and differences between the natural and social sciences as well as ethics. In this regard, we have put special emphasis on why and how the social sciences include motives, meanings, emotions, and objectives in their investigations. This allows the social sciences to explain the societal causes and drivers of environmental problems (Section 3). Drawing on these methodological considerations, Section 4 of the paper asked about the concrete contributions that social scientists and ethicists can make to biodiversity discourse. Subsequent to some general remarks regarding what the differentiation of modern societies implies for biodiversity discourse and governance, we employed concrete examples to discuss and emphasize the possible roles of the social sciences and ethics in the discourse on and governance of biodiversity (Section 4). While the first part of this paper argued from a philosophy-of-science perspective, so to speak, Section 5 took a normative stance. Here we adopted a discourse-ethics perspective. Accordingly, we argued that because and insofar as biodiversity governance affects lay people, decisions regarding biodiversity governance should be based on participative deliberative discourse. After providing an outline of our reasoning in support of these claims, we discussed how such discourses can be realized (Section 5). We have claimed that the discourse on biodiversity will be essentially incomplete without contributions from a social science perspective and from ethics. It is not just an ethical obligation that these perspectives should be included in preparing and making decisions. That their practices, habits, values, and standards be taken into consideration is also a matter of practical wisdom and good scientific practice. In addition, we would like to highlight that problem-solving capacities will only lead to solutions if committed scientists contribute to biodiversity studies by drawing on the current state of the art in their field, keeping an open mind to the strengths and weaknesses of their own profession, and harbor a sincere interest in interdisciplinary exchange. The history of the discourse on biodiversity exemplifies that without a commitment nourished by a sense of the richness and grandeur of living nature neither the protagonists of nature conservation nor their audience would have entered into a debate about the future options of societal development. In general, that is to say that, without a mixture of perceptive instinct and moral sensitivity, moral discourses, including deliberations on justice, often would not take off the ground. Seeking the chance to get involved in biodiversity research can also be viewed as an obligation for social scientists and ethicists who are attracted by biological diversity.


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Notes 1.

2. 3.

4. 5. 6.

7. 8. 9.

A brief episode reflects this widespread misconception: In 2012 the Joint Committee of the German Research Foundation (DFG) decided to establish a German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research (iDiv), jointly hosted by the universities of Halle, Jena, and Leipzig and the Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research (UFZ). Initially, the center was planned for four years and was funded with circa 33 million euros. The proposed rationale for the center was the “investigation – and thus protection – of the natural life-support systems.” However, neither the Joint Committee nor the international peer reviewers found it objectionable that no ethicists, ethnologists, political scientists, or sociologists were appointed to staff positions at the center itself. Prior to this, Walter E. Westman had published an article in Science in 1977 titled “How Much Are Nature’s Services Worth?” discussing examples of the monetary value of the benefits generated by ecosystem functions (Westman 1977). There is an old and still ongoing debate on the relation between meaning/discourses and reality, i.e. whether our understanding of reality (including our scientific understanding) is a constitutive part of reality or whether reality is external to our understanding of it. The former position means that our concepts, instruments, and ways of measuring reality are part of reality and thus significantly affect not only our knowledge of the world but also the world itself. The latter position, according to which reality is external to our instruments for grasping and measuring it, implies that reality is not affected by the way we investigate it. The – often polarized – discussions of this kind have been played out under headings such as “positivism–hermeneutics” and “realism– constructivism.” However, as several scholars have stressed, it is possible to overcome this dualism and open up space for more synthesizing approaches (see, e.g. Bernstein [1983] 2011; Delanty 2005; Fuller 1997). In this paper, we cannot discuss corresponding ontological and epistemological positions. Instead, we focus on the general agreement that the natural and social sciences differ in terms of their respective object of study. Here we use the concept of “phenomenon” to refer to something that exists or occurs and not in the sense that it is used in the phenomenological movement in philosophy. Even though the experiment is the central method for natural sciences, it uses a variety of methods to empirically test hypotheses about causal relations (such as modeling, field observations, and quasi-experiments). A classic distinction between understandings of sustainable development refers to conceptions of “weak versus strong sustainability”. Weak and strong conceptions differ in terms of the stance they take towards the substitutability between natural capital and other forms of capital. Weak sustainability holds that natural capital can be substituted for by other forms of capital. By contrast, strong sustainability conceives of natural capital as a complement of other forms of capital (Neumayer 2010). Thus, from a strong sustainability perspective development is sustainable only if natural capital is kept constant. This claim has been coined the CNCR (Pearce 1990). They emphasize that these knowledge systems are not mutually exclusive (Díaz et al. 2015, 4). In matters such as biodiversity, in which natural scientific discourse, social sciences studies, cultural designations, political debate, and ordinary language blend into one another, we use the term “deliberation” in a broad sense. Knowledge systems and deliberation can be observed by the social sciences. Foucault’s discourse analysis is a paradigmatic approach of doing so in order to understand how knowledge and discourse are related to powerful social practices (Foucault 1970). In applying this approach to biodiversity discourse, means asking which agents have gained or lost social power as this discourse became hegemonic in many areas of conservation policy and, furthermore, analyzing the modes and mechanisms of inclusion and exclusion. However, on methodological grounds, one must remain silent on whether exclusion is wrong. As soon as we were to postulate that lay persons should participate in deliberation, we would be taking a normative stance. The widespread moral aversion among the social sciences against social practices of exclusion cannot be grounded in scientific analyses of discourses, for example, of the Foucauldian kind.

ORCID C.S.A. (Kris) van Koppen http://orcid.org/0000-0001-5395-7656 Rolf Lidskog http://orcid.org/0000-0001-6735-0011

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