Hostname: page-component-745bb68f8f-kw2vx Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-02-06T19:45:00.605Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Missing the Wood for the Trees?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2017

Adam Burgess
Adam Burgess*
Affiliation:
Social Risk Research, University of Kent
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

There is little debate, particularly clear, ‘no bullshit’ debate within the risk and regulation community, much as there is a lack elsewhere within academia. Without it, much goes unclarifed and arguments aren't tested and pushed to their limits, which is generally where they need to go. On these grounds alone I would welcome the different approaches to European/American precaution set out by Vogel and Wiener. But there are more positive things to say about these competing representations, irrespective of which one prefers. This is a discussion rich in empirical detail but that goes beyond individual issues towards systemic patterns, relating the data to wider themes and an overall framework. What's more, it concerns a matter of real contemporary significance and interest that citizens generally – at least those of America and Europe – should know about, and even have a view upon. And it's genuinely interesting – irrespective of any engagement with the academic study of risk and regulation.

Type
Book Reviews
Information
European Journal of Risk Regulation , Volume 4 , Issue 2 , June 2013 , pp. 287 - 291
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2013

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 Cafaggi, Fabrizio, Book Review of The Reality of Precaution: Comparing Risk Regulation in the United States and Europe, 2(3) European Journal of Risk Regulation(2012), pp. 265–272.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

2 Moran, Michael, The British Regulatory State: High Modernism and Hyper-Innovation (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

3 Burgess, Adam, “Flattering Consumption: The Growth of Consumer Rights and Product Safety Concerns in Europe”, 1(1) Journal of Consumer Culture (2001), pp. 93–119.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

4 Burgess, Adam, Cellular Phones, Public Fears and a Culture of Precaution (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2004).Google Scholar

5 Douglas, Mary and Wildavsky, Aaron, Risk and Culture(Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1982).Google Scholar

6 Douglas and Wildlavsky, Risk and Culture, supra, note 5.