Rationale for Taking Precautions: Normative Choices and Commitments in the Implementation of the Precautionary Principle

The precautionary principle states that serious environmental threats and health hazards should be anticipated and that they ought to be forestalled before the realisation of damage even if scientific understanding of the risks is inadequate. Although the principle is a subject of intense debate and academic scrutiny, its normative underpinnings have received surprisingly exiguous attention. In this paper, the precautionary principle is explicated, which is followed by an introduction of a framework which both illuminates different normative commitments and choices related to the implementation of the principle, and enables ethical evaluation of specific understandings of the principle.