How to manage uncertainty: transgenic products and the debate over the principle of substantial equivalence

Abstract

This article analyses the various postures that contemporary societies adopt when faced with the complex and the unknown. In particular, I examine why the risks associated with new transgenic crops may prompt, on the one hand, inaction, complacency and conformism or, on the other hand, activism, suspicion and disquiet. I argue that that the principal problem in the management of scientific uncertainty involves a cognitive and epistemological question about what we know and what we don't know, as well as an ethical and normative question about what we do and what we ought to do, about both the known and the unknown. In conclusion, I explore the essential tension between the dominant social position in favour of complete freedom to investigate, produce and commercialise, versus the emergent alternative social position which advocates control, security and social and environmental responsibility.