August 2026

In its purest form, environmental science is meant to describe the world objectively, and let policymakers decide what to do about it. But what if the tools we rely on — assessments, indicators, models — do more than describe, and quietly help shape decision-making? Why do certain framings of biodiversity come to feel like simple facts rather than choices? And what happens to other forms of knowledge when we try to integrate them into scientific narratives?

To explore these questions, I spoke with Esther Turnhout, Professor of Science, Technology and Society at the University of Twente. Esther’s work focuses on how scientific knowledge is produced, made authoritative, and put to work in biodiversity policy — including through assessments like those of IPBES. We discuss how facts and values become entangled in environmental science, what tends to go wrong in interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary collaboration, and whether plural knowledge systems can really be integrated. In closing we transition onto a broader topic: Esther suggests that science may be no more universal than any other form of knowledge. This is a claim I find myself strongly resisting, and which I might pursue further another time.

Links to Resources

• ‘Measurementality’ in Biodiversity Governance: Knowledge, Transparency, and the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) - 2014 article by Esther and colleagues

• A better knowledge is possible: Transforming environmental science for justice and pluralism - 2024 article by Esther