Infrastructures of risk: a mapping approach towards controversies on risks

Abstract

Anyone concerned about food risks related, for example, to acrylamide, bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) or food supplements is confronted with vast and complex landscapes of political debates, with various uncertainties, contested responsibilities, competing knowledge and ambivalent value-making. In risk assessment procedures, these fluid complexities often get simplified to come to any evaluation at all. A retrospective review of risk scandals, however, highlights that most risks arise just from those connections in production, usage and disposal which remained unseen or were even blinded out during previous risk assessment. To better deal with these 'unknown unknowns', society at large and decisionmakers in particular need not only new strategies to avoid manufactured uncertainties but also more comprehensive knowledge tools and concepts to fully explore potential sources and connections of hazards, risks and uncertainties. Facing this challenge of risk governance, the paper discusses the potential of the visualisation ('mapping') of risk controversies and introduces the concept of 'risk infrastructures'. The aim is to equip stakeholders, laypersons and decision-makers with risk mappings which make visible how competing knowledge claims, protagonists, institutional settings, facts and values are related to each other. It will do so in referring to a prototype software application of such a 're-assembling strategy' (Actor-Network-Theory (ANT)) called 'Risk Cartography'.

Unresolved issues in risk communication research: the case of the H1N1 pandemic (2009–2011)

“…Selected studies analyze communication in case studies on H1N1, H5N1 or another health risk event or encompass different case studies . Building trust is often described as a crucial component of risk communication .…”

‘Riskscapes’ as a heuristic tool for understanding environmental risks: The Eyjafjallajokull volcanic ash cloud of April 2010

“…As the actor network is a constantly evolving the stability of the valleys is not ensured but dependent upon the continued enrolment and inscription of their defining relations between actors. Mapping out actor networks in this manner is similar to the risk cartography used by Beck and Kropp (2011) in relation to identifying and mapping infrastructures of risk. In the context of the risk of the ash cloud, the initial safety standard of ash concentration appears to be well inscribed and located within a deep valley of relations define by the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA).…”

Revealing global hot spots of technological disasters: 1900–2013

“…Risk determination focuses on understanding and measuring likely the consequential effects under various scenarios when a disaster strikes while risk management focuses on evaluating and determining what to do under uncertain hazardous conditions (Rowe 1980;Vose 2000;Bedford and Cooke 2001;Haimes 2004;Murphy and Gardoni 2006;Beck and Kropp 2011). The heart of hazard risk analysis is extrapolation from hazard's historical and current impacts through field experiments or laboratory simulations (Kates and Kasperson 1983).…”