CORDIS provides links to public deliverables and publications of HORIZON projects.
Links to deliverables and publications from FP7 projects, as well as links to some specific result types such as dataset and software, are dynamically retrieved from OpenAIRE .
Deliverables
As regulatory standards and criteria are the point of departure for the questions that performance assessment should address they provide a way to introduce societal values into the performance assessment.
This is a task for the regulatory authorities, which are legitimate representatives of society and its citizens. If the authorities involve the citizens at the stage of developing the regulations, this would be a way to include their values in the framework of performance assessment. This can mean a broad evaluation framework considering possible alternative regulations and indicators of risk. The dialogue should build confidence among stakeholders so that they can express their concerns, feel that their concerns/values are legitimate and see that their values are being incorporated.
A similar approach could be used in the development of other regulatory guidance that sets the framework for assessing projects.
As well as experimenting with specific face-to-face dialogue processes, the RISCOM II project set out to explore the use of the internet as a means of engaging young people in virtual dialogue about radioactive waste management. A series of online resources were developed for use by students aged 15-16. The reasons for producing these resources were:
- To examine the effectiveness of using online communications (i.e. the Internet and World Wide Web) in establishing discussion on radioactive waste and its management;
- To collect the views and issues of importance to a sample group of young people on this topic.
Following the creation of a project website and the development of a number of online communication tools (discussion site, message board and polling/voting system), five schools/colleges participated in the project. Between October 2001 and March 2002 an estimated 200 students and 12 members of teaching staff were introduced to these materials through five school curriculum topics. Over sixty students made contributions to the discussion on radioactive waste and its management through at least one of the online communication tools available. Almost twice this number of students was reported to have participated in local discussion with their teachers in connection with the materials made available. The work has identified several issues that should be taken into account when developing websites for use within schools. These are applicable to a website designed to discuss any topic. The findings will help anyone aiming to engage young people in dialogue on contentious issues via the internet.
The UK Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra), the Environment Agency and the Health and Safety Executive in England are actively learning from the project in developing a new schools website to accompany the current UK Government policy programme about Managing Radioactive Wastes Safely.
One of the core issues addressed in the study has been how performance assessment can be made more transparent and what is required to make it more accessible to the general public:
To incorporate the value judgements of stakeholders into performance assessment would include conducting performance assessment by starting from the issues of concern among stakeholders and communicating with them during the performance assessment work. Arrangements should then be made to make visible where values enter the performance assessment and how uncertainties are taken care of. Successful citizen involvement requires that the experts are truly open-minded and willing to include issues of concern in their assessments.
As a consequence they must be prepared to let go of some of their control over the process. It is essential that the performance assessment can keep its identity as a scientific and engineering enterprise. Engaging in public dialogue must not dilute the science and steer experts away (in focus or time-wise) too much from their core activity.
The RISCOM project has provided an opportunity to design and implement forms of dialogue processes that provide viable alternatives to the more usual public meetings often used by organisations when consulting the public on radioactive waste management and other environmental issues. Four meeting formats for dialogue processes, and the use of Internet based resources for a schools' website, were evaluated within the UK contribution to the RISCOM project.
In addition, valuable experience was gained from the Team Syntegrity dialogue process involving wide European participation. All the experimental dialogue processes involving the public were successful in clearly identifying the important issues in long-term radioactive waste management. Significant progress in developing dialogue between the public participants and 'official stakeholders', simplistically defined as those with a direct interest in radioactive waste management. The experimental dialogue processes were successful in demonstrating that there are a variety of alternative formats available for public-stakeholder dialogue on environmental issues that are potentially more productive than the conventional public meeting.
A broader understanding of the use of alternative dialogue processes has been gained that will aid the design and implementation of future consultation or participative decision-making processes. The Environment Agency and Nirex will use the results in the development of their future dialogue processes. The work will also guide Lancaster University staff as they develop and run dialogue processes in relation to their research and on behalf of others. Galson Sciences is drawing on these results in its work on stakeholder involvement in radioactive waste management issues.
The results will also be sent to the UK Government and Devolved Administrations who may use them in the development of the development of their dialogue process which are being set up to enable input into the development of UK policy on radioactive waste management.
The RISCOM model is an instrument that can analyse structural prerequisites for transparency in decision-making by modelling the organisational system underpinning a policy issue in a country.
The Model offers an instrument to compare and benchmark organisational prerequisites for transparency and to support process improvements. Comparing the structures for transparency in different countries suggests that once existing channels for transparency are diagnosed, it should be possible to use benchmarks of good practice in one country to design structures and mechanisms to improve participation and communications in others. If a particular policy and its related institutions are in a phase of transformation, the model may be used as a tool to study alternative designs of an effective organisational system for that policy issue in that setting.
However, it remains to be shown how the RISCOM Model can influence the processes of a developing waste management system, in which the system structure is emerging as waste management options are selected, developed and fulfilled. This is an instrument that still needs much debate and testing in particular settings.
The RISCOM Model had its origins in work by Kjell Andersson, Raul Espejo and Clas-Otto Wene carried out in the context of RISCOM Pilot project sponsored by SKI and SSI, the Swedish nuclear and radiological regulators. It was further developed in RISCOM II, where it gave methodological support to issues aimed at improving stakeholders communications in policy processes. In particular, with reference to nuclear waste management, it helped to:
1) Establish that the purpose of transparency is to clarify effectiveness for all stakeholders;
2) Account for stakeholders values in a policy issue often dominated by experts;
3) Develop an overview of the organisational system produced by stakeholders communications;
4)
The most valuable validation of the RISCOM Model is to see whether it is workable, meaning that it can give support in the setting up of a decision-making process or a part of it. From this point of view, perhaps the most concrete use of the RISCOM Model in this project was in the design and evaluation of the Swedish hearings.
It was found that the model was a useful tool to develop a structured hearing format. Although, as the evaluation showed, the fit between the RISCOM principles and the real conduct of the hearings was not perfect, the model had a positive impact on the hearing format, in the direction of transparency. The RISCOM Model, with supporting tools such as the TASCOI method, is thus available for use in any situation where a new step in a countrys radioactive waste management programme is to be taken to enhance transparency.
In democratic societies important decisions concerning the management of various environmental risks are made by people who may lack the expert understanding of the matters involved.
A problem common to such decision-making situations is how information on the subject being considered can best be communicated to different stakeholders. RISCOM has produced new knowledge and information based on research and reflections on current practices. The new knowledge and understanding can be used by all organisations/agencies involved in decision-making on risks.
The project has analysed and assessed various practices of dialogue in the context of environmental issues and decision-making, including the environmental impact assessment (EIA) process.
The basic question has focused on analysing how transparent the dialogue conducted has been at various levels of expression concerning facts, legitimacy and authenticity. The understanding created will be of use for all organisations planning and conducting licensing or other decision-making processes in which several stakeholders are involved.
The RISCOM project has developed a set of evaluation criteria that can be used to help in the design and then evaluation of public participation processes. The evaluation criteria were developed from a review of consultation and dialogue practices for the development of national radioactive waste management proposals and academic experience with dialogue processes.
The criteria were developed specifically for the RISCOM project and could be used in future applications of the RISCOM Model. However, they could be used for other dialogue processes relating to radioactive waste management or other contentious issues. Individual dialogue processes would need to develop their own specific list of evaluation criteria based on the aims and objectives of the dialogue process. The criteria developed in the RISCOM project could be used as input into those discussions. The evaluation criteria were also used to evaluate the dialogue processes that were implemented in the RISCOM project in the UK.
Recommendations were developed that indicate how dialogue processes can be designed and run in order to achieve the evaluation criteria. Designing dialogue processes to achieve the evaluation criteria will help to increase stakeholder involvement in decision-making and the amount of deliberation that takes place within dialogues. Galson Sciences is working with this result and is exploring its advancement in activities for stakeholder engagement in specific radioactive waste management issues. The evaluation criteria have already been disseminated and discussed at the Forum for Stakeholder Confidence Meeting of the Nuclear Energy Agency. This forum is attended by regulators, waste management organisations and policy makers associated with radioactive waste management. It brings together people from all the OECD countries. A report of this meeting has been produced, has been distributed to all the participants at the meeting and is available on the OECD website. The Environment Agency and Nirex will use the results in the development and evaluation of their future dialogue processes. The work will also guide Lancaster University staff as they develop and run dialogue process in relation to their research and on behalf of others. The results will also be sent to the UK Government and Devolved Administrations who may use them in the development of their dialogue process which are being set up to enable input into the development of UK policy on radioactive waste management.
The RISCOM II project has been able to support the radioactive waste management area with insights and methodologies for the further development of the programmes with more transparency and enhanced methods of participation. The results will be of value in other societal areas where more transparency is needed and where public participation is an issue of concern.
The RISCOM Model can support the development of criteria for public participation processes. Thereby, the project has contributed a new dimension to the science of public participation. If, as we have claimed, transparency is a requirement for a high quality decision-making process, the RISCOM Model should be part of the picture when developing topologies for describing participative processes and evaluating them.
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