Aspects influencing the roles of PBL researchers working at the science and environmental policy interface. An illustration from PBL practice.

The mission of PBL Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency is to produce policy relevant research on a sound scientific basis. Individual researchers working for PBL may take up various roles at the interface of science and policy. There are indications from literature that a role is not fixed, but varies among individual researchers and in different contexts. This raises the question what aspects may influence the role of PBL researchers and what role seems to be more adequate in a specific context. The literature mentions some important aspects, but it is not clear to what extent these aspects are relevant for the context in which PBL researchers operate. A survey of ten projects of PBL researchers was used to see what information can be gathered from practice. Two aspects seem of particular importance as they instigate researchers to reflect on their roles and take up roles other than the ‘usual’ ones. These two aspects are the strategic, agenda setting character of the activity and the unstructured character of the policy problem at hand. Finally, we discuss the consequences of these findings in terms of awareness and education, skills and competences of PBL researchers against a changing environment.