ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the ways in which uncertainty arises as a recurrent feature of the policy life-cycle. It discusses the state of the knowledge and identifies research needs in each of these areas. Acknowledging these real world conditions destabilizes the usual means by which we model, interpret, and portray the move from scientific understanding to policy construction. The chapter describes the different intersections that focus on the analyses of the local design and implementation of climate change policies. It argues that the subnational initiatives, like California's AB 32 and SB 375, provide an unrivaled opportunity to significantly improve our understanding of how uncertainty is identified and managed in local governance and community responses to legislatively directed changes. It also argues that uncertainty is inherently embedded in the communication and interaction between science and the policy process, between levels of government and between local implemented and their communities.
