Mission

The MIT Science Impact Collaborative

Mission

MIT established the Science Impact Collaborative in 2003 with support from the United States Geological Survey to find new and better ways of incorporating science into value-laden societal decisions and to develop better ways of involving a wide range of stakeholders in environmental policy-making and natural resource management decisions. The activities of the Science Impact Collaborative include theory building, teaching, curriculum development, training, and the creation of new modeling and public education tools.

Many scientists and science organizations believe that by doing more and better science, policy makers will come to value and use their work. We believe that there needs to be a fundamental realignment in the process by which science is produced and used in the context of public policymaking. Without this realignment, new tools and products developed to support decision-making will continue to be marginalized in practice.

Our focus is on testing the effectiveness of a range of collaborative planning and decision-making techniques. We believe that decision support tools (GIS, models, role play simulations, maps, cost-benefit analysis, etc.) are aids to the conversation that must occur among stakeholders. It is the process in which these tools and other boundary objects are used that will make them more effective for bridging the gaps between science, policy, and management. As the National Academy of Sciences report (2008), “Public Participation in Environmental Assessment and Decision Making,” indicates – unless stakeholders are intimately involved in policy formulation and implementation, they are likely to resist any change in the status quo. We are working to integrate the results of our action research (reflecting on the results of our interventions in the world-at-large) into theory building that will develop a rationale for the fundamental realignment that is needed.