Fairness of distribution of risks with applications to Antarctica

Summary

In this chapter we consider distributional fairness issues in decision making regarding health, safety, and environmental risks in Antarctica. Alternative safety improvements or operating procedures can result in different risk distributions among different groups of individuals at risk in Antarctica. We describe some of the risk trade-offs involved in balancing safety and environmental concerns. The focus of the chapter is on the insights for modeling fairness gained by examining the potential application of models incorporating fairness to Antarctic policymaking. Illustrative examples of alternative Antarctic policies are used to motivate the discussion of the implications for fairness modeling.

Decision analysts have recently been investigating ways to incorporate equity considerations into preference functions for guiding decision making about policy issues involving substantial risks to humans or the environment. Most of this work has been at the foundational level, with a focus on the mathematical models that can incorporate preferences for equity (see, e.g., Fishburn, 1984; Fishburn & Sarin, 1991; Fishburn & Straffin, 1989; Harvey, 1985a,b; Keller & Sarin, 1988; Keeney, 1980a,b,c; Keeney & Winkler, 1985; and Sarin, 1985 and in this book). This stream of work uses the term equity to refer in general to the fairness of the distribution of risks, with or without added information on the distribution of benefits, effort, and so on. Related work by psychologists uses the terms “equality” when outcomes are equally balanced and “equity” when deserved outcomes are balanced with inputs such as effort.