A Critical Evaluation of Global Environmental Assessments: The Climate Experience

Abstract

This paper provides an introduction, background and overview to the Workshop on Global Environmental Assessment and Public Policy -- A Critical Evaluation of Global Environmental Assessments: The Climate Experience. The workshop brought together scholars and practitioners in a joint effort to fashion a deeper critical understanding of global environmental assessment and its role in shaping the relationship between science and policy. Part 1 of this paper describes the GEA Project of which the Workshop is a part, summarizing its motivations, goals and strategic plan. Part 2 reviews the Project's first year of research on assessments of climate change and previews some of its more general findings. Finally, Part 3 turns to the Workshop proper and reviews its objectives, organization and point of departure. The first Workshop on Global Environmental Assessment and Public Policy, convened jointly by the Committee on the Environment of Harvard University and the Center for the Application of Research on the Environment (CARE) of the Institute of Global Environment and Society, Inc., took place from June 22-26, 1997 at the College of the Atlantic in Bar Harbor, Maine.