Books in the Earthscan Risk in Society series

The benefits of modern technology often involve health, safety and environmental risks that produce public suspicion of technologies and aversion to certain products and substances. This title presents an examination of how and why stigma occurs and what the appropriate responses to it should be to inform the public and reduce undesirable impacts.

This edited volume looks at whether it is possible to be more transparent about uncertainty in scientific evidence without undermining public understanding and trust. This book will be of great relevance to students, scholars and policy makers with an interest in risk analysis.

Social trust is a crucial issue to many aspects of modern society. Policy makers continually aspire to winning it and corporations frequently run the risk of losing it. This book provides an analysis for researchers and students of environmental and social sciences and suitable for those engaged in risk management in public and private sectors.

Intends to encourage a multidisciplinary approach to public safety, and the 'reenfranchisement' of those affected by this phenomenon. This book examines the origins of the problem, looks at the tools used by safety assessors and their underlying assumptions, and considers important differences between public life and industry.

Through its exploration of the spatial dimensions of risk, this book offers an approach to theorizing risk, and significant improvements in to how manage, tolerate and take risks. It examines a range of risks, including natural hazards, climate change, political violence, and state failure.

There are two questions often asked of risk communication: what has been learned from past work, and what is needed to push the field forward? Drawing on the experience of leading risk researchers and practitioners, Effective Risk Communication focuses on answering these questions. The book draws together new examples of research and practice from contexts as diverse as energy generation, human health, nuclear waste, climate change, food choice, and social media. This book treats risk communication as much more than the interchange of risk information between experts and non-experts; rather, it aims to emphasise the diversity in viewpoints and practices. In each specially commissioned chapter, the authors reflect on the theoretical and applied underpinnings of their best projects and comment on how their approach could be used effectively by others. Building upon each other, the chapters will provoke new discussion and action around a discipline which many feel is neither meeting important needs in practice, nor living up to its potential in research. Through a more careful examination of the work already done in risk communication, the book will help develop better, more reflective practice for the future.

Assessing the future is vital in informing public policy decisions. Based on an intensive five year study of how experts actually go about assessing the future, this title provides an examination of foresighting in action. It aims to help readers to reflect on their own practices of public-oriented foresight.

Trust is an important factor in risk management, affecting judgements of risk and benefit, technology acceptance and other forms of cooperation. This book explores various aspects of trust as it relates to risk management and communication. It draws on a wide variety of disciplinary approaches and empirical case studies.

Uncertainty governs our lives. This title examines uncertainty in emergency management, intelligence, law enforcement, music, policy and politics. It focuses on key problems such as environmental management, communicable diseases and illicit drugs. It offers major conceptual strands in uncertainty thinking.

Analyses the regulation of 4 kinds of complex and trans-boundary environmental issues: oil protection in the Baltic Sea, mobile phones and radiation protection, climate change adaptation and genetically modified crops. This work offers insights into how dominant frames are constructed, legitimate actors are configured and authority is established.

Brings together some of the top authors from the fields of risk, philosophy, social sciences and psychology to address the issue of how we should decide how far technological risks are morally acceptable or not. This book is suitable for researchers and students.

Explores aspects of trust as it relates to risk management and communication. This book is an examination of trust in its forms and complexities. It integrates diverse research traditions and provides insights into the phenomenon of trust.

Uncertainty governs our lives. This title draws theoretical perspectives from art history, complexity science, economics, futures, history, law, philosophy, physics, psychology, statistics and theology. It examines uncertainty in emergency management, intelligence, law enforcement, music, policy and politics.

From Hurricane Katrina and the south Asian tsunami to human-induced atrocities, terrorist attacks and the looming effects of climate change, the world is assailed by both natural and unnatural hazards and disasters. These expose not only human vulnerability, but also the profound worldwide environmental injustices. This work assesses these themes.

Provides guidance on how to manage risks based on a definitive synthesis of the research literature. This title offers a survey of the whole field of risk and demonstrates how scientific, economic, political and civil society actors can participate in inclusive risk governance.

Presents a fundamental critique of the approaches to understanding and managing risk - the 'rational actor paradigm'. This title shows how risk studies must incorporate the competing interests, values, and rationalities of those involved and find a balance of trust and acceptable risk.

The concept of risk is an outgrowth of our society's concern about coping with the dangers of life. This title examines the gap between expert views of risk and public perceptions. It allows the reader to see the evolution of our understanding of such perceptions.

Explores the conception of 'risk as feelings' and examines the interaction of feeling and cognition in the perception of risk. This book highlights perspectives on risk arising from cultural worldviews and concerns about specific hazards pertaining to blood transfusion, biotechnology, prescription drugs, smoking, terrorism, and nanotechnology.

This volume presents the ethical implications of risk information as related to genetics and other health data for policy decisions at clinical, research and societal levels. It will be of great interest to students and scholars of theoretical and clinical medical ethics, medical sociology, risk communication and ethics of risk.

From dams to landfill sites, and power plants to radioactive waste repositories, the siting of facilities is a veritable minefield of conflicts involving industry, planners, authorities, NGOs and citizens. This volume examines risk, power and identity in contests over the siting of infrastructure and industrial facilities.

Opens with an outline of the historical and linguistic origins of risk, the various disciplinary understandings of risk, the 'risk society' concept, and how risk has come to be so prominent in the context of environmental disaster and terrorism.

In the UK, Tolerability of Risk has been developed into a sophisticated framework, particularly within the health and safety sectors. This title provides a historical and topical perspective on the alternative concept of 'Tolerability of Risk' and its concrete regulatory applications.

We live in a 'risk society' where the identification, distribution and management of risks, from new technology, environmental factors or other sources are crucial to our individual and social existence. This book focuses on the analysis and management of risk in society, in international business and multinationals, and globally.

Local environments such as cities and neighbourhoods are a focal point for those concerned with environmental justice and sustainability. This book examines the changing nature of urban environmental risks, the rules governing the distribution of such risks and their differential impact, how the risks arise and who is responsible.