Can CBA be reconciled with the precautionary principle?

Although commonly thought of as rivals, cost-benefit analysis (CBA) and the precautionary principle (PP) actually can be reconciled, if you are to follow Daniel H. Cole in a RegBlog analysis published earlier this month. Cost-benefit analysis (CBA) is a well-established, if fallible, methodology for ensuring that regulations enhance, rather than detract from, overall social welfare. It acts as a filter, capturing inefficient regulations while allowing efficient regulations to pass through. While many (if not all) of the elements of CBA are inherently subjective and, thus, subject to political manipulation to bias outcomes, the twin formal requirements of transparency of assumptions and replicability of calculations can provide a reasonably robust defense against outright manipulation. On the other hand, the precautionary principle (PP) generally calls for a higher level of regulation or other prevention of risky market activities. The PP and CBA are often treated as alternative, even competing, decision tools. The author argues that CBA is capable of incorporating a PP without sacrificing its own chief virtues of transparency and replicability.