46 Int. J. Sustainable Development, Vol. 16, Nos. 1/2, 2013 Copyright © 2013 Inderscience Enterprises Ltd. From ecology to society and back: the (in)convenient hypothesis syndrome Víctor H. Marín* and Luisa E. Delgado Laboratorio de Modelación Ecológica, Departamento de Ciencias Ecológicas, Facultad de Ciencias, Universidad de Chile, Casilla 653 Santiago, Chile E-mail: vmarin@antar.uchile.cl E-mail: ldelgado@antar.uchile.cl *Corresponding author Abstract: In this article, we analyse the case of the emigration and death of black necked swans in Southern Chile from a postnormal perspective. We show that in the presence of radical uncertainty, as it may happen when a socio-ecological conflict arises due to a sudden, catastrophic, shift in an ecosystem, one management approach is to consider multiple hypotheses that in turn should guide inclusive, multi-variable, adaptive management strategies. However, if influential members of society at the science-policy interface decide that only one hypothesis is true (a convenient hypothesis), then all alternative hypotheses become inconvenient; we have called this the ‘(in)convenient hypothesis syndrome’ or (I)CHS. An extensive analysis of the case study, including social communications before, during and after the main ecological event, show that the conditions for the syndrome developed long before the shift in the ecosystem and that they were influenced by socio-political processes (some of which fall under Merton’s self-fulfilling prophecy) occurring at many scales (from local to international). Our main proposal is that the syndrome is to be accepted as an element of the postmodern science-policy interfaces, originated because scientific results may support different hypotheses, some of which will have conflicting political repercussions. Keywords: environmental conflict; wetland ecosystem; regime shift; social actors; science-policy interfaces; southern Chile. Reference to this paper should be made as follows: Marín, V.H. and Delgado, L.E. (2013) ‘From ecology to society and back: the (in)convenient hypothesis syndrome’, Int. J. Sustainable Development, Vol. 16, Nos. 1/2, pp.46–65. Biographical notes: Victor H. Marín is a Full Professor of Ecosystem Ecology at Universidad de Chile and the Head of the Laboratory for Ecological Modelling. His fields of expertise are ecological modelling, coastal ecosystem analysis and integrated ecosystem studies. Luisa E. Delgado holds a PhD in Social Sciences and MSc in Ecology. She is the Leader of Eco-social Studies in the Laboratory for Ecological Modelling at Universidad de Chile. Her fields of expertise are social and political ecology and ecosystem ecology.