ABSTRACT
The U.S. Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA), Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA), Federal Insecticide, Fungicide and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA), Water Pollution Control Act (WPCA), and National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) all require that toxicity be addressed in standard ways for substances that may nd their way into the environment. Unlike decisions based on mammalian toxicology, a discipline in which much basic research was done before enactment of such laws, decisions associated with ecotoxicology rely heavily on knowledge developed primarily within a regulatory framework (Dagani 1980). This has the advantage of focusing effort in the most ef cient way possible to address very real regulatory needs. However, it also imposes a structure to the associated knowledge base that is decidedly not scienti c, i.e., not organized on the basis of the most plausible explanatory principles as determined by the scienti c methods (see Chapter 1). Also, there is an inherent delay in incorporating new information because the regulatory framework is built on the best information available at the time of enactment. Honesty requires that one also acknowledge the resistance from vested government and private institutions during most attempts at science-based change. Given the immediacy of our needs during the last several decades and the nature of institutions as they attempt to maintain their vested positions in a process, this regulatory context and behavior is understandable. However, for the sustained growth of sound knowledge in ecotoxicology, a framework based on scienti cally sound explanatory principles must emerge in a timely manner as the dominant one. This chapter discusses the area of ecotoxicology with the strongest regulatory in³uence and, consequently, most in need of periodic and very careful reexamination.
