Introduction

[Chris Bruce <cjbruce@ucalgary.ca>]

My name is Chris Bruce. I teachh in the Department of Economics at the University of Calgary (in the Canadian Rockies). I first became interested in public participation when I sat on a Parks Canada committee that was trying to determine "appropriate uses" for Banff National Park; that is, the goal of this committee was to advise Parks how to resolve conflicts among skiers, hikers, tourism operators, sightseers, hoteliers, environmentalists, etc, etc. This has led me, over the last five years or so to investigate numerous techniques for identifying public preferences and for converting those preferences into policies. 

My general goal in studying these techniques has been to identify those that seem most likely to produce polices that maximise social benefits. My goal in participating in EPA's review process is to learn more about the successes that EPA has had with public participation; and about the suggestions that people have for improvements to that process. 

I hope to be able to offer insights that I have learned from the study of various Canadian public participation processes (particularly in western Canada) and from my study of the theoretical literature on public policy formation.