RISK SOCIETY

1
RISK SOCIETY

• Society and Sociology in the New Millennium
  Lecture 6
• Dr. Chris Rumford

2
Introduction

• Welcome to this PowerPoint presentation on risk
  society
• This topic links with the work we have already
  done on postmodernity, globalization, and the
  challenges to sociology posed by shifts away from
  industrial society
• The risk society thesis is associated with the
  work of Ulrich Beck

3
Approaches to risk

• According to Mythen (2004) there are four major
  social science approaches to risk
• Anthropologists (e.g. Mary Douglas) look at
  variations in understandings of risk in different
  cultures
• Psychologists examine individual cognition of
  risk
• Foucauldian approaches to risk explore the role
  of social institutions in constructing
  understandings of risk (e.g. Dean, 1999)
• Sociologists such as Beck and Giddens look at the
  pervasive effects of risk on everyday life.
• In this class, we will look at the fourth
  approach, UIrich Becks risk society thesis.

4
Introducing Becks work

• For Beck, the central contradiction in
  contemporary society is that there exist
  mega-dangers or hazards that are on the one hand
  created by society itself, but on the other are
  neither attributable nor accountable nor even
  manageable within society (Strydom, 2002 59)
• i.e. organized irresponsibility
• This means we are moving towards a risk society.
• Paradigmatic risks are nuclear, chemical,
  genetic, ecological.

5

• From terrorism to environmental hazards and the
  risks inherent in everyday lifestyle choices
  (food, relationships, mobile phone usage) we seem
  to be bombarded with risk, and information about
  risk.
• Contemporary society seems to be characterised by
  risk and debates on how it should be managed at
  both the institutional and personal levels.
• However, we need to ask what it means to
  characterise western societies as risk
  societies and investigate further the changes
  that this designation supposes.

6
Management of risk in everyday life

• Listen to the Radio 4 programme Thinking
  Allowed (23 March 2005) presented by Laurie
  Taylor on the topic of Management of risk in
  everyday life featuring, amongst others, David
  Denney, Professor of Social and Public Policy at
  Royal Holloway, and the author of a new book Risk
  and Society
• http//www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/factual/thinkingallow
  ed_20050323.shtml
• click on the box labelled Listen again
  towards the left-hand side

7
Risk society natural or man-made?

• Is it not the case that societies have always
  been risk societies?
• Beck says that in pre-modern society risks were
  associated with the natural world plague,
  famine, earthquakes etc. (or taken as evidence of
  supernatural forces)
• This was a world of uncertainty, rather than risk
• In the contemporary world risk emerges as
  consequence of human activity (e.g.
  over-production)
• In this sense, we can say that risk has replaced
  uncertainty

8

• We have moved from a world of where uncertainty
  was the result natural hazards
• to a world where risks are manufactured or the
  product of human attempts to dominate nature.
• Please read the newspaper article Unnatural
  disasters by Andrew Simms which can be found at
  http//www.guardian.co.uk/analysis/story/0,3604,10
  63081,00.html
• What does this tell us about the nature of
  manufactured risks?

9
Ulrich Beck Risk Society Towards a New
Modernity (Sage, 1992)

• Beck argues that we have witnessed a shift from
  the production and distribution of goods
• to a concern with the prevention and
  minimization of bads (i.e. risk)

10
Read the Wikipedia entry on Ulrich
Beckhttp//en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ulrich_BeckRea
d A Summary of Ulrich Becks Risk Society
Towards a New Modernityhttp//www.nextreformation
.com/html/resources/risk-society.pdf
11
The nature of risk

• Since mid-C20th industrial society has been
  confronted with threats to human life on an
  unprecedented scale
• Environmental catastrophe
• Nuclear power
• Biological weapons

12

• Beck argues that whereas natural risks
  (uncertainties) were calculable and manageable
• In risk society calculation, management, and
  insurance all fail. Risks are no longer
  localized, visible, and easily containable.
• Contemporary risks have the following key
  qualities
• They are not limited in time and space
• They can be catastrophic
• Mechanisms of social insurance are inadequate
  (welfare provision)

13
The Chernobyl disaster

• The Chernobyl nuclear disaster in the Ukraine in
  1996 is a case in point the risks were not
  localized no one country could manage them the
  risks posed are to future generations.

14
Please read the report Chernobyl accident and
aftermathhttp//news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/special_repo
rt/1997/chernobyl/32651.stm

15

• Chernobyl was a catastrophic event, the effects
  of which were not limited in time and space, and
  against which mechanisms of protection and
  compensation were totally inadequate
• Please read the article Chernobyl still haunts
  hill farms which can be found at
  http//news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/3049759.stm
• Why do you think 180,000 sheep in Wales remained
  affected by radioactive fall-out 17 years after
  the disaster?
• What does this tell us about the nature of risk?

16
The extent of Chernobyl fallout
17

• In industrial society risks were evident to the
  senses.
• Today, many risks escape immediate perception
• radiation
• toxic chemicals
• pollution
• GM food

18

• In addition, risks are increasingly contested
• GM food is a good example industry, governments
  and farmers argued that no risk attaches to
  genetically modified foods, while the banking
  sector withdrew from investing in biotechnology
  and supermarkets banned GM food from their
  shelves in view of the European publics
  perception of genetic engineering as a high risk
  technology (Strydom, 2002 60).
• Scientists have lost authority over risk
  assessment and risk calculations can be
  challenged by pressure groups and activists
• Beck says that there is a struggle over the
  meaning of risk between those who produce them
  (experts) and those who consume them (public)

19

• Please read the following articles
• Pollution fears over sperm count
  http//news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/3378315.stm
• Rural mobile phone use riskier
  http//news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/4552645.stm
• Worried consumers 'shun GM foods'http//news.bbc
  .co.uk/1/hi/uk/3618386.stm
• Mobile phones tumour risk to young children,
  http//www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,8122-14365
  43,00.html
• What do these articles tell us about the
  contested nature of risk assessment?
• Who can we trust when looking for guidance?

20
Concluding section

• Poverty is hierarchical, smog is democratic
  (Beck)
• In industrial society the impact of poverty was
  experienced differentially
• Risk cannot be mapped onto class
• Even the rich and powerful are not safe from risk

21

• For Beck, risk society is closely related to
  globalization
• Many risks have an obvious global dimension
• Pollution
• Global warming
• Nuclear power
• New communities of risk can be created across
  national borders communities of danger
• Global problems demand global solutions
• Risk society is also world risk society

22

• This is related to the idea of reflexive
  modernization
• In risk society, society becomes more reflexive
  (self-criticism of society intensifies) and
  society acts to change itself
• One (positive) outcome of this reflexivity is
  that we recognise the need to develop cooperative
  international institutions (e.g. the UNs Kyoto
  Protocol) http//unfccc.int/essential_background/k
  yoto_protocol/items/2830.php
• Industrial society comes to see itself as risk
  society

23
Finally

• Whereas class society was dominated by idea of
  (in)equality and welfare, risk society is
  dominated by the idea of safety.
• Beck says, The dream of class society is that
  everyone wants and ought to have a share of the
  pie. The utopia of the risk society is that
  everyone should be spared from poisoning (Beck,
  1992 49)

24

• The driving force in the class society can be
  summarized in the phrase I am hungry! The
  movement set in motion by the risk society, on
  the other hand, is expressed by the statement I
  am afraid! (Beck, 1992 49)
• Communities of need have given way to communities
  of anxiety
• Insecurity has replaced scarcity

25
References

• Beck, U. 1992 Risk Society towards a new
  modernity. London Sage.
• Beck, U. 1999 World Risk Society. Cambridge
  Polity Press.
• Dean, M. 1999 Governmentality power and rule in
  modern society. London Sage.
• Denney, D. 2005 Risk and Society. London Sage.
• Lupton, D. 1999 Risk. London Routledge
• Mythen, G. 2004 Ulrich Beck a Critical
  Introduction to the Risk Society. London Pluto
  Press.
• Strydom, P. 2002 Risk, environment and society.
  Buckingham Open University Press.
• http//www.theorycards.org.uk/