Alternatives to cost-benefit analysis for economic evaluation

Science and scientific devices, such as cost-benefit analysis (CBA), involve an implicit effort to rationalize policy-making. In political science, these efforts are not new. Social scientists cannot assume that the notion of policymakers improving their decision-making via means of scientific knowledge necessarily speaks for itself. Beyond the outputs that devices such as CBA offer, health economists and policy makers need to build their relationship by additional means. As environmental policy interventions make their way through policy processes-stages such as agenda setting, policy formulation, adoption, implementation, and evaluation-environmental health economists need to engage and participate in nuanced and entrepreneurial ways, demonstrating an ability to work with both CBA and the many alternatives to it