Silke Gabbert and Hans-Peter Weikard: Precaution, essential resources and basic individual rights: the case of the European chemicals policy

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Precaution, essential resources and basic individual rights: the case of the European chemicals policy

21 pp.
4.80 EUR
(October 2009)

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In this paper Silke Gabbert and Hans-Peter Weikard deal with different interpretations of the precautionary principle from the perspective of decision theory. It is included in this section because the weak and strong sustainability concepts sometimes contain hidden assumptions regarding risks and implications of the precautionary principle. Gabbert and Weikard analyse four prominent approaches to precautionary decisions-making. They notice that those approaches share a welfaristic basis which implies that current benefits and future risks are traded off against each other. However, the people who will live in the future are individuals with equal basic rights. Their lives and health cannot be put at risk for the sake of current benefits, not even for the sake of future benefits. Fundamental decisions about which risks to take should be left to each individual, or – if a collective decision is assumed – to each generation. In this perspective a precautionary policy recommends a low growth and a low vulnerability system over a high growth and high vulnerability system. This seems to strengthen Ott’s claim for strong sustainability.

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