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The Politics of Researching Carbon Trading in Australia

This paper explores the conflicts of interest present in science policy and how claims being
made for evidence based science can be used to suppress critical social science research. The
specific case presented concerns the attempts to ban and censor my work criticising the
economics of carbon emissions trading while I was working for the Commonwealth
Scientific Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) in Australia. The role of management
and the Science Minister are documented through their own public statements. The case
raises general issues about the role of epistemic communities in the production of knowledge,
the potential for manipulation of information under the guise of quality control and the
problems created by claiming a fact-value dichotomy in the science-policy interface. The
implications go well beyond just climate change research and challenge how public policy is
being formulated in modern industrial societies where scientific knowledge and corporate
interests are closely intertwined. (author's abstract) / Series: SRE - Discussion Papers

Identiferoai:union.ndltd.org:VIENNA/oai:epub.wu-wien.ac.at:4277
Date January 2014
CreatorsSpash, Clive L.
PublisherWU Vienna University of Economics and Business
Source SetsWirtschaftsuniversität Wien
LanguageEnglish
Detected LanguageEnglish
TypePaper, NonPeerReviewed
Formatapplication/pdf
Relationhttp://epub.wu.ac.at/4277/

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