Background and rationale
In the fields of governance – particularly health and environmental governance – new forms of normativity have taken hold in Africa (as elsewhere), leading to an increasingly marked alignment with the normative standards of the globalized world and, in particular, to the widespread use of indicators and statistical models, linked to complementary or antagonistic deontic repertoires, in a movement tending towards the densification, or even hyper-densification, of norms in contemporary societies. The paradox is that this hyper-densification, which is supposed to improve the governance of societies and the environment, produces conflicts of interpretation, dissensual alternatives and, consequently, uncertainty, and even leads to a relative denial of scientificity, which can take the form of the over-determination or under-determination of scientific statements about the nature of things by statements about responsibilities towards them. Neither attitude denies the scientific nature of science, but consists in managing – on the basis of other orders of magnitude – the scope and, in some cases, the validity of the statements that refer to it. Scientific statements are thus embedded in discourses that regulate their application to the world of everyday life.
If we follow the majority of speeches warning of global warming and the scientific arguments they contain, the way forward seems, if not simple, at least clear. However, the question arises of the practical measures to be taken to combat it, their social acceptability and their impact on the continent’s development. From an African point of view, it is not illegitimate to consider that developed nations should make the main effort. This point of view, however, refers to a different principle of order than the one that leads us to promote the fight against global warming. Here, the principle of equity underdetermines the ecological emergency and the scientific statements on which it is based.
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The questioning of these statements raises an epistemic (and epistemological) issue, that of the embedding of data on nature in normative narratives that are the only way to turn them into guides for action. There is no naturalness of science, and therefore no naturalness (in the sense of self-sufficient evidence) of pro-environmental positions, but rather the work of “realizing” them, as the German ethnomethodologist Thomas Scheffer (https://www.fb03.uni-frankfurt.de/116042899/Forschung?) undoubtedly points out heuristically. This work consists in making them real for the actors by linking them to sets of norms and deferences, like deference to science. It’s a task carried out by members of society (in various capacities), and not a matter of stating the obvious. It first mobilizes epistemic communities (in the sense of Haas: Epistemic communities, constructivism, and international environmental politics. London, Routledge, 2015), whose task is to give social meaning to scientific statements, based on expert knowledge of them. However, this epistemic production is itself reinserted into more manageable narratives in order to promote action by public authorities or mobilize opinion (as advocacy NGOs do, for example). It’s at this stage that controversies arise. Indeed, while scientific results are difficult to take to task (for lack of the skills needed to refute or technically support them), the same cannot be said of the narratives that incorporate them. Many of them, moreover, contain normative registers that can be used to support positions contrary to those they enunciate. The “justice” register can, for example, justify the idea that African states should not participate in endangering the planet, as well as justifying the fact that they do not have to sacrifice their development in order to reduce the impact of carbon energies, of which Europe, America and part of Asia are the main consumers. More generally, they can refuse to accept a unilateral definition of global issues. This attitude implies, in one way or another, the adoption of a relativization of the climatic stakes – i.e. of the level of risk involved – and, therefore, a relativization of the scientific results on which the “realization” of the climate crisis is based.
