More on Expert Panels

Roger Pielke (who writes in Prometheus) cites a National Research Council (NRC) report stating that presidential appointments to science and technology committees not be asked about their political or policy viewpoints because these do not predict an expert’s perspective on a particular policy.

He seems to be arguing that politics can’t be segregated from the empaneling and working of expert committees. His proposed solution is “to focus our attention on developing transparent, accountable and effective processes to manage politics in science -- not to pretend that it doesn't exist”.

Chris Mooney questions how this would prevent politicians from stacking of panels during the empaneling process.

After some thought, I come down on Chris’s side on this. I’m a fan of transparency, but how much do people really pay attention to who these experts associate with, who they are getting funding from, what positions they have on different issues in their disciplines? If people in a transparent society start paying close attention to these issues, and see that there is no balance in expert committees, they could eventually become cynical about expertise altogether.

Expert panels depend on their credibility and politicians would do well to think twice about the implications of stacking expert committees, just to get outcomes that benefit their sponsors; unless they’re interested in wrecking science altogether.