Abstract

Dealing with uncertainty has become a matter of great concern for policy makers and scientific research in a world facing global, epochal and complex changes. But in essence, you cannot entirely predict the future. This article aims at conceptualizing the limits to anticipate the future – or what is often referred as the substitution of risk for uncertainty. In contrast to most theories examining risk and uncertainty, we start from the assumption that there are limits in the substitution of risk for uncertainty and that distinguishing between ontological and epistemic levels of analysis helps clarify such limits. The paper makes two arguments: first, most approaches see no ontological and/or epistemic limit in the substitution of risk for uncertainty; second, the pluralization of science is the only way to cope with limits in substituting risk for uncertainty. This second argument draws on the assumption that accounting for the uncertainty of the future depends on knowledge production processes able to overcome disciplinary boundaries and better include lay and expert knowledge. In times of great concerns regarding mitigation and adaptation to the ecological crisis, we illustrate our arguments with insights from global environmental governance.

摘要

在一个面临全球性、时代性和复杂性变化的世界中，如何应对不确定性已成为决策者和科学研究人员非常关心的问题。但本质上，你无法完全预测未来。本文旨在概念化预测未来的限制——或者通常被称为用风险代替不确定性。与大多数研究风险和不确定性的理论相比，我们从以下假设开始：用风险代替不确定性是有限制的，区分本体论和认知水平的分析有助于澄清这些限制。该论文提出了两个论点：首先，大多数方法在用风险代替不确定性方面没有看到本体论和/或认知限制；第二，科学的多元化是应对以风险代替不确定性的限制的唯一途径。第二个论点基于这样一个假设，即对未来不确定性的解释取决于能够克服学科界限并更好地包括非专业知识和专家知识的知识生产过程。在人们非常关注缓解和适应生态危机的时候，我们用全球环境治理的见解来说明我们的论点。