Risk society
According to Wikipedia, “Risk society” is a term that emerged during the 1990s to describe the manner in which modern society organises in response to risk. The term is in particular realted to Anhony Giddens’ The Consequences of Modernity
Risk and vulnerability in the risk society
In a conference paper presented at the 15th Nordic Research Conference on Safety (NoFS XV) in 2003, and available for download below, Hovden picks up and elaborates the notions of risk society, and he says that
New risks are continuously revealed and linked to changes in technology, biology, social tensions and politics. A main difference from traditional risks is that they are independent of the place where you live or work. … The modern risk awareness is not about our own experiences or the current statistical risk picture of deaths and injuries, but about an uncertain future. Fear and anxiety of these threats which we are uncertain or ignorant about, are a great challenge for risk management even though the probabilities for such events may be microscopic. The frightening is that we dont know, and are out of control. We feel like victims.
In the same paper he presents the figure below which describes a holistic macro-micro perspective on risk management in the risk society, where hazards/threats and events create a combined backdrop of risk and vulnerability:
Critique
In my opinion this is a complete framework that fully captures the immediate (personal) and more distant (societal) effects of accidental and malicious events. Applied to a supply chain, the “personal” sphere could be replaced by a “business” sphere, while leaving the national sphere as is. This would be in line with what Peck (2006) wrote in Reconciling supply chain vulnerability, risk and supply chain management, where supply chains link industries and economies and serve a purpose that extends far beyond the functional concerns and stated aims of SCM.
References
Hovden, J (2003) Theory Formations related to the “Risk Society”. Paper presented at NoFS XV 2003, Karlstad, Sweden, 13th to 15th June 2003
Hovden, J. (2004). Public policy and administration in a vulnerable society: regulatory reforms initiated by a Norwegian commission Journal of Risk Research, 7 (6), 629-641 DOI: 10.1080/1366987042000192228
Author link
- ntnu.no: Jan Hovden
Related
- husdal.com: Can it really be that dangerous