| Precautionary
Principle
One of the
main dilemmas in technology design and implementation and the interaction
with the environment is our lack of the capability of foresight about
long-range and long-term implications. This is evident in the case of
the use of pesticides, especially DDT. While DDT helped reduce malaria
and saved millions of lives, its overuse left a long-term deadly environmental
legacy that we are still trying to understand. Chlorofluorocarbons and
ozone depletion, fossil fuel use and global warming, persistence of organochemcials
in the environment and the endocrine disruption we are still at a loss
to comprehend completely are all results of unforeseen long-term consequences
of technological use gone rampant. Philosopher Hans Jonas has called on
us to consider the “causal pregnancy” of technology. We now
have enough instances to know how the effects of technology, compounded
with the complex network that constitutes our environmental system can
lead to large negative consequences. So now we are duty-bound to do proactive
not just reactive, management of technology.
The Precautionary
principle is a philosophy that aims at forestalling disasters. This principle
is a “general rule of public policy action to be used in situations
of potentially serious or irreversible threats to health or the environment,
where there is a need to act to reduce potential hazards before there
is a strong proof of harm, taking into account the likely costs and benefits
of action and inaction.” (European Environmental Agency. “Late
Lessons from Early Warnings: The Precautionary Principle 1896-2000,”
EEA, 2001). The EEA Report also points out an example of “precautionary
prevention” from London in 1854, when John Snow, a London physician,
worked to get the city to remove one pump whose drinking water seemed
to be associated with a lot of cases during a cholera epidemic. It was
only 30 years later that the German scientist Koch showed that the cholera
virus was indeed spread through water polluted by excretion from patients.
The elements
of the policies based on Precautionary Principle being promulgated in
much of the European Union include:
- Research
and monitoring for the early detection of hazards.
- A general
reduction of the environmental burden
- The
promotion of clean production and innovation
- The
proportionality principle, where the costs of actions to prevent hazards
should not be disproportionate to the likely benefits
- A cooperative
approach between stakeholders to solving common problems via integrated
policy measure that aim to improve the environment, competition, and
employment
- Action
to reduce risks before full “proof” of harm is available
if impacts could be serious or irreversible
With an
increasing adoption of this precautionary philosophy, we may be moving
forward as a society for a better environment and state of health.
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