Phantom Risk
Author: Kenneth R. Foster
Publisher: MIT Press
Published: 1999
Total Pages: 476
ISBN-13: 9780262561198
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThis book surveys a dozen scientific issues that have led to public controversy and litigation.
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Risk
Author: David Ropeik
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Published: 2002
Total Pages: 500
ISBN-13: 9780618143726
DOWNLOAD EBOOKPublisher Description
Electrosmog, a Phantom Risk
Author: Christian Brauner
Publisher:
Published: 1996
Total Pages: 44
ISBN-13:
DOWNLOAD EBOOKTainted
Author: Kristin Sharon Shrader-Frechette
Publisher:
Published: 2014
Total Pages: 313
ISBN-13: 0199396418
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThree-fourths of scientific research in the United States is funded by special interests. Many of these groups have specific practical goals, such as developing pharmaceuticals or establishing that a pollutant causes only minimal harm. For groups with financial conflicts of interest, their scientific findings often can be deeply flawed. To uncover and assess these scientific flaws, award-winning biologist and philosopher of science Kristin Shrader-Frechette uses the analytical tools of classic philosophy of science. She identifies and evaluates the concepts, data, inferences, methods, models, and conclusions of science tainted by the influence of special interests. As a result, she challenges accepted scientific findings regarding risks such as chemical toxins and carcinogens, ionizing radiation, pesticides, hazardous-waste disposal, development of environmentally sensitive lands, threats to endangered species, and less-protective standards for workplace-pollution exposure. In so doing, she dissects the science on which many contemporary scientific controversies turn. Demonstrating and advocating "liberation science," she shows how practical, logical, methodological, and ethical evaluations of science can both improve its quality and credibility -- and protect people from harm caused by flawed science, such as underestimates of cancers caused by bovine growth hormones, cell phones, fracking, or high-voltage wires. This book is both an in-depth look at the unreliable scientific findings at the root of contemporary debates in biochemistry, ecology, economics, hydrogeology, physics, and zoology -- and a call to action for scientists, philosophers of science, and all citizens.
The Politics of Precaution
Author: David Vogel
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Published: 2012-04-29
Total Pages: 332
ISBN-13: 0691124167
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThe Politics of Precaution examines the politics of consumer and environmental risk regulation in the United States and Europe over the last five decades, explaining why America and Europe have often regulated a wide range of similar risks differently. It finds that between 1960 and 1990, American health, safety, and environmental regulations were more stringent, risk averse, comprehensive, and innovative than those adopted in Europe. But since around 1990, the book shows, global regulatory leadership has shifted to Europe. What explains this striking reversal? David Vogel takes an in-depth, comparative look at European and American policies toward a range of consumer and environmental risks, including vehicle air pollution, ozone depletion, climate change, beef and milk hormones, genetically modified agriculture, antibiotics in animal feed, pesticides, cosmetic safety, and hazardous substances in electronic products. He traces how concerns over such risks--and pressure on political leaders to do something about them--have risen among the European public but declined among Americans. Vogel explores how policymakers in Europe have grown supportive of more stringent regulations while those in the United States have become sharply polarized along partisan lines. And as European policymakers have grown more willing to regulate risks on precautionary grounds, increasingly skeptical American policymakers have called for higher levels of scientific certainty before imposing additional regulatory controls on business.
Estimating Health Risks from Infrastructure Failures
Author:
Publisher: American Water Works Association
Published: 2006
Total Pages: 172
ISBN-13: 1583214682
DOWNLOAD EBOOKHealth risks from infrastructure failures are not well understood, despite the potential widespread introduction of chemical, microbial, and physical contaminants, as well as service disruptions. This study gathered input from various experts to define these issues. A strategy for intervention and mitigation was developed along with and mechanisms for timely, direct, inter-agency communication, coordination, and collaboration.
Institutional Investors in the New Financial Landscape
Author: OECD
Publisher: OECD Publishing
Published: 1998-10-07
Total Pages: 491
ISBN-13: 9789264163065
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThis publication gives a comprehensive overview of the major driving forces behind recent trends, future prospects, financial market implications as well as regulatory and supervisory challenges related to the rise in institutional assets.
Cellular Phones, Public Fears, and a Culture of Precaution
Author: Adam Burgess
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Published: 2004
Total Pages: 314
ISBN-13: 9780521520829
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThis is the first account of the health panic surrounding cellular phones that developed in the mid-1990s. Treating the issue as more 'social construction' than evident scientific problem, it tells the story of how this originally American anxiety diffused internationally, having an even bigger impact in countries such as Italy. Burgess highlights the contrasting reactions to the issue ranging from positive indifference in Finland to those such as the UK where precautionary measures were taken. These differences are located within the emergence of a precautionary culture driven by institutional insecurity that first appeared in the US and is now most evident in Europe. Anxieties about cell phone radiowaves are also situated historically in the very different reactions to technologies such as x-rays and in the more similar 'microwave suspicions' about television. In addition, Burgess outlines a history and sociology of what is, despite media-driven anxieties, a spectacularly successful device.
In the Chamber of Risks
Author: William Leiss
Publisher: McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP
Published: 2001
Total Pages: 405
ISBN-13: 0773522387
DOWNLOAD EBOOKIn In the Chamber of Risks William Leiss demonstrates that case studies of risk controversies show that those instincts are unreliable guides to effective risk management and that in all cases the opposite position is a far better guide. As risk management is inherently disputable, public perceptions of risk should be seen as legitimate and treated as such and the public should always be involved in discussions about risk evaluations made by scientists and risk managers. ; Leiss chronicles the erratic course of risk management and communication in environmental management in Canada, discussing the notable controversies that have arisen over pesticides and breast cancer, vinyl toys, genetically engineered food crops, cellular telephones, and antibiotic-resistant bacteria, among many others. He focuses on risk management - how we make decisions about and assess hazards in the environment - and on risk communication - social dialogue that deals with both our intuitive feelings of concern about substances or activities that might hurt our health or the environment, and the scientific and probabilistic description of them. ; Leiss shows that both risk management and risk communication, when properly constructed, require an elaborate process because the very things that can cause harm are in most cases the same things that bring us great benefits, such as paper mills, electricity from nuclear power generating stations, or wireless telecommunications. ;
Strategic Risk Management Practice
Author: Torben Juul Andersen
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Published: 2010-03-04
Total Pages: 269
ISBN-13: 1139483811
DOWNLOAD EBOOKAt a time when corporate scandals and major financial failures dominate newspaper headlines, the importance of good risk management practices has never been more obvious. The absence or mismanagement of such practices can have devastating effects on exposed organizations and the wider economy (Barings Bank, Enron, Lehmann Brothers, Northern Rock, to name but a few). Today's organizations and corporate leaders must learn the lessons of such failures by developing practices to deal effectively with risk. This book is an important step towards this end. Written from a European perspective, it brings together ideas, concepts and practices developed in various risk markets and academic fields to provide a much-needed overview of different approaches to risk management. It critiques prevailing enterprise risk management frameworks (ERMs) and proposes a suitable alternative. Combining academic rigour and practical experience, this is an important resource for graduate students and professionals concerned with strategic risk management.
