Embracing Uncertainty in Policy-Making: The Case of the Water Sector

Recent research on policy-making under uncertainty in the water sector has contributed to our understanding of types and sources of uncertainty as well as to the development of tools and approaches to manage uncertainty. This paper reviews the literature and identifies several strands of systematic bias, notably an emphasis on natural sources of uncertainty over human sources; a tendency to treat sources of uncertainty as independent and a corresponding neglect of interaction between sources; and a focus on tools to reduce or contain uncertainty rather than to accommodate it. The papers in this issue contribute to overcoming these biases.