Overcoming Nanomaterial Uncertainties: A Responsive Governance Framework

Abstract

The UN Sustainable Development Goals aim to minimize the adverse impacts of chemicals on human health and the environment by 2020. It is up to legislators to provide the appropriate framework conditions for such developments. In the case of nanomaterials, this task is however quite challenging, as risks of these substances to human health and the environment are to a great extent uncertain. In situations of such regulatory complexity, legislators can benefit from responsive governance approaches that take into account the actual incentive and impediment situation of the relevant actors to facilitate innovation behaviour that is directed at sustainable development. To this end, this article suggests an integrative governance perspective, based on institutional analysis, taking into account all relevant external framework conditions as well as behavioural settings of actors along the supply chain of nanomaterials.