Isolation or Integration? The Relationship Between Risk Assessment and Risk Management

SIMON GERRARD AND JUDITH PETTS

1 Introduction

The potential impact of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) has proved to be one of the most controversial risk management issues of the decade. Whilst interspersed with numerous other risk controversies, BSE has outperformed many of its contemporaries in terms of length, scientific uncertainty, economic impact and public outrage. One of the most pressing decision problems was how best to deal with the carcasses such that the public would be confident that the threat of BSE contamination was negligible. In June 1997 the Environment Agency in the UK issued a press release explaining the results of trial burns it had conducted at two coal-fired power stations. 1 It reported that:

'The risk of human infection resulting from burning cattle cull wastes in power stations would be negligible. A detailed risk assessment, carried out by the Agency, based on test rig trial burning of meat and bonemeal (MBM) and tallow from cattle slaughtered under the Goverment's Over Thirty Month Scheme (OTMS) shows that the risk of an individual contracting CJD (Creutzfeldt Jacob Disease) would be as low as 1 in 30 000 million. This is 3000 times less than the risk of death by lightning'.

The press release went on to confirm that, though the studies showed that the risk to both the public and the workers would be negligible, the Agency would not be giving blanket approval to applications for cattle incineration. Approval would only be granted if all statutory requirements were met: 'Every application will be rigorously assessed on its own merits and there will also be widespread public consultation before a decision is taken'.

It is indicative of current risk debates that a regulatory agency chooses to announce the result of its quantitative risk assessment in the same breath as its assurance that, despite the extremely low risk, widespread public consultation will occur in advance of any decision. This example could be interpreted in different ways. Some may question why widespread consultation is necessary if the risk is so low. Others may ask what is so wrong with the risk assessment that widespread consultation is still necessary?

The rise of risk assessment as a tool for decision makers comes in the face of mounting criticism from those in industry who argue that it is too conservative in its assumptions and thus creates public fear and unnecessary financial hardship and from environmental and community groups who see the tool as too simplistic and narrow to deal with the complex reality of risk issues. Characterizing risk debates is fraught with difficulty as terms are interchangeable and possess different meanings for different parties. However, these positions may be characterized by the extent to which risk assessment is regarded merely as one of many tools available to decision makers or as a decision-making process itself.

Risk management encompasses disciplines from the natural, engineering, political, economic and social sciences. One of the key issues highlighted by the multidisciplinarity of risk management is whether risk assessment as a scientific process can and should be separated from risk management. The basis of the arguments for and against separation are rooted in fundamental views of the role of science and society. Over the 20–30 year period of risk management research much has been learned, though many of the important lessons (not least stakeholder involvement) relate as much to the challenges of working in a multidisciplinary setting as to the development of the single disciplines involved.

Whilst we recognize that risk assessment is clearly a part of the process of managing risks, we also note that there are many different risk assessment approaches in different decision-making contexts. It is beyond the scope of this article to discuss all of the variabilities. Instead, we focus on example applications of risk assessment at different tiers of decision making: project/site-specific, strategic regulation and policy making. This includes two distinct types of risk assessment. Quantitative risk assessment relates to an activity or substance and attempts to quantify the probability of adverse effects due to exposure. In contrast, comparative risk assessment is a procedure used for ranking risk issues by their severity in order to prioritize and justify resource allocation. The examples of these two types discussed here provide a means of illustrating (i) how risk assessment is being used in decision making, (ii) the issues which this use raises in relation to robustness, efficiency and fairness, and (iii) whether and how risk assessment can be more...