Identifying key stakeholders and including them in the process is extremely important in environmental decisions, as these decisions typically concern many different groups.
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What are stakeholders?
Stakeholders are individuals, groups, or organisations that:
- Are directly or indirectly affected by the decision outcome.
- Have the power to influence the decision process.
- Have an interest (financial, social, environmental, political, etc) in the impacts of the decision
Typical key stakeholder groups
Identification of key stakeholders and including them in the process is extremely important in environmental decisions, as these decisions typically concern many different groups such as:
- Private sector/industry.
- Wider public and society, including local communities and residents.
- Environmental NGOs and advocacy groups.
- Government and regulatory authorities.
- Scientists and experts.
- Financial institutions and funders.
In terms of inclusiveness, transparency and stakeholders’ commitment, it is very important to include all key stakeholder groups in the process.
There are various systematic stakeholder analysis approaches for identifying stakeholders and their roles based, for example, on their power/influence, their interest in the decision and the level of impact on them.
Outcome of the phase: A list of stakeholders to be included in the process.
Follow up Questions for the AI
Ask the following questions to get more information from the AI:
- Can you elaborate the roles of typical stakeholder groups related to environmental decisions?
- What approaches can be used to systematically identify and classify the stakeholders?
- What issues should be considered when categorising the stakeholders and deciding who to include in the process?
- What are the means to ensure that all the different viewpoints of the stakeholders would become included in the process?
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Benefits and Risks of Using AI
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Benefits (+)
- Support for systematically identifying and classifying typical stakeholder groups in environmental decisions.
- Support for carrying out various stakeholder analysis and prioritisation techniques.
Benefit Scoring: + Low
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Risks (!!)
- Lack of contextual understanding about the local situation.
In its suggestions, AI cannot know the local context and the background of the case, which may include, e.g. conflicts between stakeholders that have been going on for decades or other hidden issues.
- Lack of transparency
It may be unclear how stakeholders were identified or prioritized which may reduce accountability, legitimacy and stakeholders’ trust to the decision process
- Over-reliance on AI (automation bias)
May lead to ignorance of subtle social, cultural, or political factors and overly technocratic decisions on which stakeholders to include in the process
Risk Scoring: !! Medium
Questions to Better Understand the Benefits and Risks of AI
Questions to make use of the benefits
- See the questions above
- I have this problem: [description of the problem]. What stakeholder groups are typically involved in these kinds of problems and what are the roles of the stakeholders?
Questions to avoid the risks
- What are the possible risks of using AI to support identification of stakeholders in environmental decision-making?
- [After getting suggestions of stakeholders] Critically evaluate the suggested stakeholders in terms of fairness and inclusiveness
Questions NOT to ask
- I have this problem: [description of the problem]. Which stakeholder groups should
be included in the process
AI cannot determine ethical or political priorities on its own, but human judgment and accountability should be included in the decision. These kinds of questions may also oversimplify complex social dynamics related to the problem