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The Summary for policymakers is a summary of the IPCC reports intended to aid policymakers. The content is determined by the scientists, but the form is approved line by line by governments. Negotiations occur over wording to ensure accuracy, balance, clarity of message, and relevance to understanding and policy.
Criticism of the summary
Several authors, including some scientists whose work was cited in the Technical Summary, claim that the SPM doesn't represent the science correctly.
SPM downplays the seriousness of the situation
Keith Shine, a lead author of the 1995 IPCC Second Assessment Report, wrote:
We produce a draft, and then the policymakers go through it line by line and change the way it is presented.... It's peculiar that they have the final say in what goes into a scientists' report."
Kevin E. Trenberth, lead author of the 2001 IPCC Scientific Assessment of Climate Change, wrote:
Scientists determine what can said, but the governments determine how it can best be said. ... The IPCC process is dependent on the good will of the participants in producing a balanced assessment. However, in Shanghai, it appeared that there were attempts to blunt, and perhaps obfuscate, the messages in the report...
SPM overstates the case for anthropogenic global warming
Fred Singer wrote:
The Science and Environmental Policy Project conducted a survey of IPCC scientific contributors and reviewers; we found that about half did not support the Policymakers' Summary. Parallel surveys by the Gallup organization and even by Greenpeace International produced similar results.
Richard Lindzen wrote:
The report is prefaced by a policymakers' summary written by the editor, Sir John Houghton, director of the United Kingdom Meteorological Office. His summary largely ignores the uncertainty in the report and attempts to present the expectation of substantial warming as firmly based science.
External links
- SPM for the TAR
- Comments on the process by Kevin E. Trenberth
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- "The SPM was approved line by line by governments in a major meeting, which took place over four days in Shanghai, China, in January 2001." The IPCC Assessment of Global Warming 2001
- A Treaty Built on Hot Air, Not Scientific Consensus, S. Fred Singer, Wall Street Journal, July 25, 1997]
- The IPCC Assessment of Global Warming 2001
- S. Fred Singer, Wall Street Journal, July 25, 1997
- Global Warming: The Origin and Nature of the Alleged Scientific Consensus