Conceptual analysis explores normative challenges for science advisory systems in failing democracies, highlighting applications of the precautionary principle.
This paper focuses on the relation between science and democracy by addressing some general normativity questions for science advice as democracies start to fail. It is a fact that the number of working democracies has been shrinking and the number of flawed or failing democracies is growing, with the U.S.A. as a prominent example.Footnote1 The normative challenges this very development gives rise to for how to conduct science advice need discussion and study; knowledge of and respect for science surely seem necessary for a working democracy. What follows is a start, inspired by some versions of the precautionary principle,Footnote2 exploring good and some bad properties of responses from the scientific community in this situation.
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Olav Gjelsvik (2026) studied this question.
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