It is over 40 years since we began to reflect upon risk in a more social than technological and economic fashion, firstly making sense of the gap between expert and public assessment of risks, such as to our health and environment. With fixed certainties of the past eroded and the technological leaps of ‘big data’, ours is truly an age of risk, uncertainty and probability - from Google’s algorithms to the daily management of personal lifestyle risks. Academic reflection and research has kept pace with these dizzying developments but remains an intellectually fragmented field, shaped by professional imperatives and disciplinary boundaries, from risk analysis to regulation and social research. This is the first attempt to draw together and define risk studies, through a definitive collection written by the leading scholars in the field. It will be an indispensable resource for the many scholars, students and professionals engaging with risk but lacking a resource to draw it all together.
Adam Burgess is Professor of Risk Research in the School of Social Policy, Sociology and Social Research at the University of Kent. His principal interests are in comparative national and historical perspectives on risk, sociological studies of ‘risk behaviours’ and anxieties, and the social and political construction of particular risk controversies. He has also been a research fellow on the systemic risk programme at Princeton University and is research associate at the Centre for the Analysis of Risk and Regulation at the London School of Economics. He has published numerous articles and books on risk-related topics, including Cellular Phones, Public Fears and a Culture of Precaution (Cambridge UP 2004). He is chair and vice-chair of the risk and uncertainty streams of the European Sociological Association and International Sociological Association and co-edits the European Journal of Risk Regulation.
Alberto Alemanno is Jean Monnet Professor of Law at HEC Paris and Global Clinical Professor at New York University School of Law. He is the Founder and Editor-in-Chief of the European Journal of Risk Regulation. Due to his commitment to bridge the gap between academic research and policy action, he regularly provides advice to a variety of NGOs and governments across the world as well as international organizations on various aspects of European Union Law and global risk regulation. Originally from Italy, Alemanno is a graduate of the College of Europe and Harvard Law School. He holds a PhD from Bocconi University. Prior to entering academia fully time, he clerked at the Court of Justice of the European Union and qualified as an attorney at law in New York. His latest books are Nudge and the Law (Hart Publishing, 2015) and Regulating Lifestyle Risks (Cambridge University Press, 2015). Alberto was named 2015 Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum.
Jens Zinn is Associate Professor in Sociology at the University of Melbourne. He researched on risk and social change and how institutions and individuals deal with risk and uncertainty in several research centres and networks in Germany (Status Passages and Risks in the Life Course, Bremen, 1995-1999; Reflexive Modernisation, Munich, 1999-2002) and the UK (Social Contexts and Responses to Risk, SCARR, 2003-2008). In 2015 the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation awarded Zinn the prestigious Friedrich-Wilhelm Bessel Award for his academic achievements.
