Rhetoric and Risk

Abstract

Demarcating the Domain of Rhetoric The discoveries of science and technology are accelerating. The choice of how to regulate and react to scientific and technological innovations relies heavily on the notion of risk. The emergence nature contemporary science and technology (i.e., complex systems that are not reducible to the simple physical and chemical processes from which they arose) confounds risk studies (Goodenough & Deacon, 2006). Indeed, whether to embark on a particular path of scientific inquiry or proceed with a technological development depends on the ability to calculate the amount of risk associated with the endeavor. We are, however, ill-equipped to resolve the demands of risk analysis with certainty. The greater the negative risk, the greater our reticence to proceed. The very term "calculate," however, invests risk with a far greater degree of objectivity and precision than actually present in the conduct of science or policymaking. Sandman's (1993) famous definition of risk as "the sum of hazard plus outrage" positions emotion (albeit only one species of it) placed squarely alongside the calculus of threat probability-much as Aristotle, who brought emotion into the charmed circle of internally artful means of persuasion, declared rhetoric the counterpart (antistrophe) of dialectic. Research on the significance of affective forces in determining how people perceive risk (Slovic, 2000, 2010) creates ample opportunities for rhetorical studies to complement social scientific research on cognition of risk. What Can Rhetorical Approaches to Risk Offer? The field of communication is no stranger to the realm of risk, but most attention has focused on risk management, often approached as crisis communication (e.g., Venette, 2006). This area of study concentrates on how to package and present phenomena to audiences in ways that accomplish the rhetor's intent, which is usually to steer audience perceptions in a particular direction or to protect the interests of stakeholders. Risk management thus operates within a compliance

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