The Role of Stakeholder Involvement in Risk Communication

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The Role of Stakeholder Involvement in Risk
Communication

• Second International ILK Symposium28.-29. Oct.,
  2003
• Ortwin Renn
• Center of Technology Assessment

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Objectives of Risk Communication

• Enlightenment Making people able to understand
  risks and become risk-literate
• Behavioral changes Making people aware of
  potential risks and help them to take protective
  actions
• Trust building Assisting risk management
  agencies to generate and sustain trust
• Conflict resolution Assisting risk managers to
  involve major stakeholders and affected parties
  to take part in the risk management process

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Part 1

• What is special about risk ?
• Important Lessons for Stakeholder
  Participation

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Risk CharacteristicsThree challenges of risk
management

• Complexity in assessing causal and temporal
  relationships
• Uncertainty
• variation among individual targets
• measurement and inferential errors
• genuine stochastic relationships
• system boundaries and ignorance
• Ambiguity in interpreting results

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Need for different risk management strategies

• Dealing with routine, mundane risks
• Dealing with complex and sophisticated risks
  (high degree of modeling necessary)
• Dealing with highly uncertain risks (high degree
  of second order uncertainty)
• Dealing with highly controversial risks (high
  degree of ambiguity)
• Dealing with eminent dangers (need for fast
  responses)

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Application to Stakeholder Involvement I

• For routine risk management, communication should
  include
• Information on the process of risk management
• Information on potential protective behavior
• Information on routine risk management actions
• If necessary, a hot-line for questions and
  observations
• For highly complex risks,communication should
  include
• All of the above
• Discourse among experts on range of risk
• Additional effort for collecting feedback

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Application to to Stakeholder Involvement II

• For highly uncertain risks, communication should
  include
• All of the above
• Involvement of major stakeholders
• Possibly, public hearings
• Complete documentation and publication of all
  steps of decision making
• For highly ambiguous risks, communication should
  include
• All of the above
• Involvement of all parties affected by the risk
  decision

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The Risk Management Escalator (from simple via
complex and uncertain to ambiguous phenomena)
Risk Tradeoff Analysis and Deliberation
Necessary Risk Balancing Necessary Risk
Assessment Necessary Types of Conflict cognitive
evaluative normative Actors Risk
Managers External Experts Stakeholders such as
Industry, Directly Affected Groups Representatives
of the Public(s) Discourse participatory Ambiguo
us
Risk Balancing Necessary Risk Assessment
Necessary Types of Conflict cognitive evaluative
Actors Risk Managers External Experts Stakeholder
s such as Industry, Directly Affected
Groups Discourse reflective Uncertain
Scientific Risk Assessment Necessary Types of
Conflict cognitive Actors Risk
Managers External Experts Discourse cognitive Com
plex
Routine operation Actors Risk managers Discourse
internal Simple
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Part 2

• A model of stakeholder involvement in risk
  communication
• The Cooperative Discourse Model

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General Requirements for a Participation Model

• Fairness
• inclusion of all affected parties
• representation of all relevant arguments
• representation of all relevant interests and
  values
• Competence
• communicative ability (able to make claims and
  challenge them)
• substantive validity (state of the art in
  knowledge)

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Specific Requirements for Participation Models

• Clear mandate and time frame
• Range of available and suitable options
• Willingness of legal decision makers to give
  product of participation serious attention
• Willingness of all parties to learn from each
  other
• Refraining from moralizing other parties or their
  positions

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Candidates for Participation Models

• Organized stakeholders
• Hearing
• Round Tables
• Negotiated Rulemaking
• Mediation and Alternate Conflict Resolution
• General public
• Ombudsperson
• Public Hearings
• Citizen Advisory Committees
• Citizen Forum, Planning Cells, Citizen Juries
• Consensus Conferences (Danish Model)

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The Cooperative Discourse Model I

• Three components
• Criteria and values from organized stakeholders
• Facts and cognitive judgments from experts
• Balancing and assignment of trade-offs by
  representatives of the general public (or
  affected citizens)
• Procedure
• Identification of values, concerns and criteria
  through stakeholder deliberation
• Assessment of factual consequences of each option
  on each criterion though expert workshops
• Option evaluation and recommendations by randomly
  selected citizens

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The Cooperative Discourse Model II

• Methods and Techniques
• Value tree analysis for eliciting stakeholder
  concerns
• Group Delphi technique for expert judgments and
  assessments
• Planning cell methods relying on
  multi-attribute-decision techniques for
  incorporating public preferences and values
• Advantages of three-stage approach
• Fairness through random selection and systematic
  selection of stakeholders
• Competence through involvement of experts and
  decision makers

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Application of the Cooperative Discourse Model

• Germany
• Energy scenarios for 1. German Enquete Commission
• Waste disposal management plans for the Northern
  Black Forest Area
• Switzerland Siting of a landfill in the Canton
  of Aargau
• USA Sludge disposal planning in New Jersey

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Part 3

• General Conclusions
• Pros and consstakeholder participation

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Summary I

• Risk communication serves the needs of
  enlightenment, behavioral advise trust building
  and conflict resolution
• Risk communication needs to address complexity,
  uncertainty and ambiguity
• There is no recipe book, but good advise
  available for integrating stakeholders in risk
  communication
• Participation can be designed to serve five
  different communication scenarios

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  Summary II Need for public participatory
processes  - demand for more direct
participation - integration of facts and values
- deliberation offers new solutions to intense
value conflicts Problems of public
participation  - fair representation of all
interests and values - assurance of competence
and factual accuracy - interface with legal
decision making bodies - public
accountability - efficient and effective
handling of problems 
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 Summary III Possible solution Hybrid model
integrating  - technical, social, and cultural
competence - different constituencies - anecdot
al as well as systematic evidence - deliberative
and representative modes of decision
making Potential model Cooperative
discourse  - values and options through
stakeholders - factual assessments by expert
workshops (Group Delphi) - evaluation by
citizen panels
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 Final Note Deliberative Processes for
involving stakeholders and the general public are
instruments of art and science They require a
solid theoretical knowledge, a personal
propensity to engage in group interactions, and
lots of practical experience