10. Institutionalising Lived Experience in the Public Policy Process

Reasons for institutionalising lived experience in public policy processes on climate change vary, depending on whom one asks. Government, the private sector, scientists, engineers and civil society each have different, albeit sometimes complementary and sometimes overlapping, reasons. We, the authors of this book, also have reasons, namely that institutionalisation of lived experience within the policy process:We also argue that through our institutionalised engagement with one another we come to appreciate our human and human–nature interdependence and the potential to develop a transboundary, social imagination among citizens and scientists alike. Institutionalisation, however, raises many issues. These range from basic human attributes of just how much knowledge we may hold and tell to establishing the basic conditions for productive engagement and managing enduring power relations between actors and their sources of power. The chapter ends by examining three potential ways in which we might institutionalise lived experience in public policy making on climate change: