ABSTRACT
This chapter provides an overview of social science challenges in global environmental research. After a sketch of backgrounds, the 'social dilemma' is introduced as a major research question. It is asserted that uncertainties over global environmental change provoke innovative studies on risk behaviour and management of long-range, largely unpredictable, phenomena. Problems of global environmental change are not isolated from the way individuals, groups and governments take decisions in our society. The essence of social science research questions in the area of global environmental change is the so-called 'social dilemma'. Various economists have tried to cope with the social dilemma by looking for correction mechanisms which would fully incorporate all, marginal, social costs of global environmental decay. A prominent focal point in global environmental change research would have to be uncertainty and risk assessment. It is often taken for granted that uncertainty is lower in natural science phenomena governed by fixed laws and regularities.
