Innovative Thinking in Risk, Crisis, and Disaster Management

Risk is an enduring theme of modern life. It permeates the political, economic and environmental domains. Some risks are unavoidable. Others are not. Innovative Thinking in Risk, Crisis, and Disaster Management provides ideas and action plans for risk, crisis, and disaster management in a risk society, based on late-modern approaches such as technological citizenship; delegated authority; and exploitation of 'lay' knowledge. Written in an accessible style, with technical terms defined and explained, it offers genuinely original thinking that will be of interest to academics, students, and commentators. Primarily though, it will be of value to practitioners in the emergency services, industry and commerce, and to planners and policy makers at national and local government level. The book deals with issues of civil safety and security. It covers management of socio-technical risks and hazards; environmental risk; social and economic impacts of ICT; and risk perception. In addition it touches upon terrorism; public order; emergency responding; high risk technologies; energy supply; climate change; natural disasters; and employment-related issues-all within a social context that prioritises risk reduction. The problems we face in the twenty-first century are not intractable. All we need is a little less dogma and a little more imagination.