Risk, Disaster, and Vulnerability: An Essay on Humanity and Environmental Catastrophe"Over the course of the past century, there has been a sustained reflective engagement about environmental risks, disasters, and human vulnerability in the technocene (a term used by some humanist scholars to characterize the era in which we live, characterized by complex technologies with accompanying hazards that can potentially harm human societies and their living environments on historically unprecedented scales). This inquiry has raised a host of crucial questions. Just how safe in humanity is in a world of toxic chemicals and industrial installations that have destructive potential? What are the discordant consequences of the transformations of the natural world by twentieth century technologies? To what extent is it feasible to contain chemical, nuclear, and other pollutants? Is it at all possible to prevent runaway disasters in highly complex industrial technoscapes? In what way do environmental hazards impact social and political orders? The purpose of this essay is to help scholars and indeed ordinary citizens not versed in the extent literature in scientific, public policy and humanistic genres, understand their social theoretic import"-- |
Contents
Setting the Stage | 1 |
Risk | 8 |
Disaster | 49 |
Vulnerability | 81 |
Looking Ahead | 115 |
Bibliographic Essays | 125 |
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action agencies ambiguity analysis Anthropocene approach argued Bhopal Bhopal gas disaster bioaccumulative Cambridge catastrophic chemicals Chernobyl Chernobyl Disaster communities complex concept consequences contexts corporate cultural debate decisions democracy economic effects environment Environmental Humanities environmental justice environmental risks example experts exposure factors failures Flint gas leak global goal hazards high reliability organization HROs human error impacts important individuals industrial disasters infrastructure interactions involving issues keywords laypeople literature ment mistakes Moreover nature neoliberal normal accident nuclear operators organization outcomes patterns of vulnerability Perrow plant political pollution post-normal science potential precautionary principle problem processes public policy reflexivity regulatory response result risk and disaster risk assessment risk management risk paradigm role ronmental safety scenario scientific significant silicosis social society stemming Stirling and Mayer strategy studies technocene technologies term theory tion toxic toxins Ulrich Beck uncertainty understanding Union Carbide University Press victims violations Wildavsky workers