Table Of ContentRoutledge Handbook
of Risk Studies
It has been over 40 years since we began to reflect upon risk in a more social than technological
and economic fashion, making sense of the gap between expert and public assessment of risks,
such as to our health and the environment. With fixed certainties of the past eroded and the techno-
logical leaps of ‘big data’, ours is truly an age of risk, uncertainty and probability – from Google’s
algorithms to the daily management of personal lifestyle risks. Academic reflection and research
has kept pace with these dizzying developments but remains an intellectually fragmented field,
shaped by professional imperatives and disciplinary boundaries, from risk analysis to regulation
and social research. This is the first attempt to draw together and define risk studies through
a definitive collection written by the leading scholars in the field. It will be an indispensable
resource for the many scholars, students and professionals engaging with risk but lacking
a resource to draw it all together.
Adam B urgess is Professor of Risk Research in the School of Social Policy, Sociology and
Social Research at the University of Kent. His principal interests are in comparative national and
historical perspectives on risk, sociological studies of ‘risk behaviours’ and anxieties, and the
social and political construction of particular risk controversies.
Alberto A lemanno i s Jean Monnet Professor of Law at HEC Paris and Global Clinical
Professor at New York University School of Law. He is the Founder and Editor-in-Chief of the
European Journal of Risk Regulation .
Jens O. Z inn i s T. R. Ashworth Associate Professor in Sociology at the University of Melbourne.
He researched on risk and social change and how institutions and individuals deal with risk and
uncertainty in several research centres and networks in Germany, the UK and internationally.
He is awardee of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation 2015.
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Routledge Handbook
of Risk Studies
Edited by Adam Burgess, Alberto Alemanno
and Jens O. Zinn
First published 2016
by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
and by Routledge
711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
© 2016 Adam Burgess, Alberto Alemanno and Jens O. Zinn
The right of the editors to be identified as the authors of the editorial
material, and of the authors for their individual chapters, has been asserted
in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and
Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or
utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now
known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in
any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing
from the publishers.
Trademark Notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or
registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation
without intent to infringe.
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Names: Burgess, Adam, editor.|Alemanno, Alberto, editor.|
Zinn, Jens, editor.
Title: Routledge handbook of risk studies/edited by Adam Burgess,
Alberto Alemanno and Jens Zinn.
Description: Abingdon, Oxon; New York, NY: Routledge, 2016.
Identifiers: LCCN 2015039776|ISBN 9781138022867 (hardback)|
ISBN 9781315776835 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Risk–Sociological aspects.|Risk management–Social aspects.
Classification: LCC HM1101.R68 2016|DDC 302/.12–dc23
LC record available at http://lccn.loc.gov/2015039776
ISBN: 978-1-138-02286-7 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-1-315-77683-5 (ebk)
Typeset in Bembo
by Sunrise Setting Ltd, Brixham, UK
Contents
List of figures viii
List of tables x
Notes on contributors xi
Introduction 1
Adam Burgess
PART I
Basic concepts and development 15
1 The experience of ‘risk’: genealogy and transformations 17
Claude-Olivier Doron
2 Probability 27
Ruben Van Coile
3 Understanding uncertainty: thinking through in relation
to high-risk technologies 39
Kenneth Pettersen
4 Trust and risk 49
Patrick Brown
5 The reconceptualization of risk 58
Terje Aven
6 Why risk is recursive and what this entails 73
Jerry Busby
PART II
Social approaches to risk 81
7 Risk and culture 83
John Adams
v
Contents
8 Risk and theory in Germany 94
Wolfgang Bonß and Jens O. Zinn
9 Governmentality and the analysis of risk 109
Pat O’Malley
PART III
Hazard assessment and decision making 117
10 Assessing and mitigating natural hazards in a very uncertain world 119
Seth Stein
11 Heuristics and biases in decision making about risk 131
Andrew Weyman and Julie Barnett
PART IV
Risk management 141
12 Health and safety and the management of risk 143
Laurence N. Ball-King and David J. Ball
13 Risk management: sociotechnological risks and disasters 155
Jean-Christophe Le Coze
14 Quantitative risk management and its limits: a UK engineering
perspective 164
Roger Kemp
15 Disaster risk management 179
Kristian Cedervall Lauta and Michael G. Faure
PART V
Regulation and governance 189
16 Risk and regulation 191
Alberto Alemanno
17 Risk governance: concept and application to technological risk 204
Ortwin Renn and Andreas Klinke
18 The evolution of the regulatory state: from the law and policy of
antitrust to the politics of precaution 216
Giandomenico Majone
vi
Contents
PART VI
Key research dimensions 229
19 Risk, medicine and health 231
Andy Alaszewski
20 Risk knowledge(s), crime and law 241
Kelly Hannah-Moffat
21 Risk, social policy, welfare and social work 252
Hazel Kemshall
22 Risk and media studies 262
John Tulloch
PART VII
International aspects 273
23 Global risk 275
Jakob Arnoldi
24 Terrorism, risk and insecurity: debates, challenges and controversies 282
Gabe Mythen
25 Risk, (in)security and international politics 290
Claudia Aradau
PART VIII
Emerging areas 299
26 Digital risk society 301
Deborah Lupton
27 Risk and ignorance 310
Matthias Gross
28 Imagining risk: the visual dimension in risk analysis 318
Hermann Mitterhofer and Silvia Jordan
29 Resilience and risk studies 335
Kristian Krieger
30 Risk taking 344
Jens O. Zinn
Index 356
vii
Illustrations
Figures
2.1 Results of an experiment where a fair die is rolled 1,000 times: observed
frequencies N /N and (theoretical) long-term frequency of 1/6 30
A
2.2 Results of an experiment where a fair die is rolled 1,000 times: observed
frequencies N /N and (theoretical) long-term frequency of 1/6 30
A
5.1 A person (John) placed under a boulder 61
5.2 A schematic illustration of some of the fundamental components of the
risk concept in relation to the time dimension 62
5.3 Main features of a conceptual framework for linking risk, risk source
and events in line with the (C,U) perspective 63
5.4 A risk matrix, based on specified consequences and probabilities, which
incorporates the strength of knowledge 69
6.1 Summary model of a risk interaction process 77
7.1 Different types of risk 85
7.2 The risk thermostat with cultural filters 86
7.3 Boundaries of acceptable and tolerable risk 87
7.4 Ratio of pedestrian and cyclist fatalities to car occupant fatalities (1970–2006) 88
7.5 Road accident deaths per billion vehicle kilometres GB (1950–2012) 89
7.6 Development and road accident fatalities 90
8.1 Citations for U. Beck in Google Scholar 96
10.1 Comparison of Japanese hazard map to the locations of
earthquakes since 1979 that caused ten or more fatalities 122
10.2 Comparison of earthquake hazard, described as peak ground acceleration
(PGA) as a percentage of the acceleration of gravity expected with 2 percent
risk in 50 years, predicted by various assumptions for two sites in the
central US 125
10.3 Comparison of successive Italian hazard maps, which forecast some
earthquake locations well and others poorly 127
10.4 Comparison of total cost curves for two estimated hazard levels 128
12.1 Trend in fatal injuries to workers in the UK, 1994–2014 144
12.2 The 1966 Aberfan disaster may have influenced the Robens Report 146
12.3 HSE’s ‘Tolerability of Risk’ framework 148
viii
Illustrations
13.1 Defence in depth model 160
13.2 Migration model 161
14.1 Extract of accident investigation report 1869 165
14.2 Cockpit information available to pilots 166
14.3 Risk matrix 168
14.4 Part of a fault tree 169
14.5 Demonstrating ALARP 171
14.6 Single-rail and double-rail track circuits 172
14.7 Probability of 50 Hz rail current causing track circuit to operate 173
14.8 Daily wind energy output, winter 2008–9 176
17.1 Adaptive and integrative risk governance model 205
17.2 Boundaries of acceptable and tolerable risk 209
17.3 Relationship between stakeholder participation and risk categories
in risk governance 211
28.1 Typology of visualizations 320
28.2 Choropleth risk map portraying three degrees of environmental risk 321
28.3 Choropleth map, based on the Winkel Tripel projection, showing
political risk in 2013 322
28.4 Gridded cartogram on the disappearance of childhood 324
28.5 Cybernetic representation of risk management processes in a circuit diagram 325
28.6 Risk matrix 326
28.7 The risk interconnection map 327
28.8 Decision tree for a cocktail party 328
28.9 Example of decision tree or event tree 329
28.10 Information graphic composed by an insurance company 330
28.11 Information graphic showing road traffic accidents 331
ix
Illustrations
Tables
2.1 The three basic axioms of probability theory 28
2.2 Smoke alarm performance data in dwelling fires, as recorded
by the Scottish fire brigades 31
3.1 Different knowns and unknowns 41
13.1 Macondo well disaster in relation to key concepts of the literature 158
13.2 List of sociotechnological concepts (and/or topics) in relation
to scientific (and engineering) disciplines (indicative) 159
13.3 A déjà vu feeling 30 years apart 162
14.1 Severity definitions 168
14.2 Frequency definitions 168
27.1 Types of ignorance 312
29.1 Relations between risk and resilience 338
x
