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CRITICAL STUDIES IN RISK AND UNCERTAINTY
Understanding
Risk-Taking
Jens O. Zinn
Critical Studies in Risk and Uncertainty
Series Editors
Patrick Brown
University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Anna Olofsson
Mid Sweden University
Östersund, Sweden
Jens O. Zinn
University of Melbourne
Melbourne, VIC, Australia
Palgrave’s Critical Studies in Risk and Uncertainty series publishes mon-
ographs, edited volumes and Palgrave Pivots that capture and analyse
how societies, organisations, groups and individuals experience and con-
front uncertain futures. An array of approaches for mitigating vulner-
ability to undesired futures has emerged within social contexts around
the world and across history, with risk being seen as an especially salient
technique to have emerged within, while also characterising, processes
of modernisation. These approaches have attracted the critical attention
of scholars across a wide range of social science and humanities disci-
plines including sociology, anthropology, geography, history, psychol-
ogy, economics, linguistics, philosophy and political science. This series
will provide a multidisciplinary home to consolidate this dynamic and
growing academic field, bringing together and representing the state of
the art on various topics within the broader domain of critical studies
of risk and uncertainty. It aims to provide cutting edge theoretical and
empirical, as well as established and emerging methodological contribu-
tions. The series welcomes projects on risk, trust, hope, intuition, emo-
tions and faith. Moreover, the series is sensitive to the broader political,
structural and socio-cultural conditions in which particular approaches
to complexity and uncertainty become legitimated ahead of others.
Explorations of the institutionalisation of approaches to uncertainty
within regulatory and other governmental regimes is also of interest.
Understanding
Risk-Taking
Jens O. Zinn
University of Melbourne
Melbourne, VIC, Australia
This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Switzerland AG
The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland
Acknowledgements
v
Contents
1 Introduction 1
References 11
3 Different Disciplines 35
3.1 Biology–Psychology–Economics 35
3.2 From Public Responses to Risk to the Social
Enforcement of Risk-Taking 40
3.2.1 Challenging the Expert-Lay Distinction 42
3.2.2 Risk and Culture 46
3.2.3 Risk and Governmentality 49
3.2.4 Risk Society 53
3.2.5 Limits of Sociological Explanations 57
vii
viii Contents
Glossary 317
Bibliography 327
Index 363
List of Figures
xi
List of Tables
xiii
1
Introduction
Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that
you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines.
Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails.
—Mark Twain2
1Helen Keller (1880–1968), American author, political activist and lecturer was the first deaf-
blind person to earn a Bachelor of Arts degree.
2Samuel Langhorne Clemens (1835–1910) or better known as Mark Twain was an American
element of life and the ‘biggest risk in life is not taking a risk at all.
Life is all about risk as we do not ever know the outcome of any sit-
uation, so there is always a risk in it not working out at all. We live
our lives through making certain choices and then decide on what risks
we should take’.3 Thus, risk-taking is not only for entrepreneurs who
decide to invest in a new technology such as fracking, or politicians
who allow genetically modified food to enter the market. Taking risks is
also about average people’s decisions such as to take on a job, or who to
marry (or whether to marry at all), whether to invest in bonds or buy a
house, whether to make a contract with one or another health insurer,
whether to holiday in Cambodia or at home, whether to ride a motor-
cycle or climb the Alps.
However, taking risks is not only a necessary and ordinary part of
life. Risk-taking is also about interrupting the ordinariness and repet-
itiveness of life which rewards us with an intensified feeling of being
alive. Opposing the rather mundane understanding, this position sees
taking real risks as an opportunity which rarely opens in everyday
life and grants us the possibility of proving our composure, of show-
ing character or even greatness (Goffman 1969). As the Philosopher
Anne Dufourmantelle explained in an English-language lecture:
‘Is being in life just being born? Probably not. To me, risking your life is
not dying yet, it’s integrating that you could be dying in your own life.
Being completely alive is a task, it’s not at all a given thing. It’s not just
about being present to the world, it’s being present to yourself, reaching
an intensity that is in itself a way of being reborn’. There is no doubt
that for Dufourmantelle risk-taking was not only an abstract academic
reflection (Dufourmantelle 2011) when at 21 July 2017 she entered the
water at a beach in Ramatuelle—a seaside commune in France’s Côte
d’Azur region—to save two children struggling about 45 metres from
the shore. Tragically, the 53-year-old Dufourmantelle paid a high price
for her courageous attempt to selflessly save the children in trouble.
strong.
1 Introduction
3
She was swept away by the strong currents and could not be resuscitated
whereas the children were finally saved by lifeguards.
Dufourmantelle’s tragedy reminds us that risk-taking is about the
possibility that things can turn out badly, that the negative possibility
we wanted to avoid sometimes materialises. It is then in hindsight that
questions are raised as to whether it was worth taking a risk, whether
the undesired outcome could have been prevented, and whether there
is somebody else to blame. Experts and expert knowledge will come
forward to judge about risk-taking, and politicians may eventually take
decisions to prevent us from taking risks with a potentially catastrophic
outcome. Thus, risk-taking is not only a mundane experience. It is not
merely about an intensified feeling of being alive. It becomes part of the
social machinery which produces knowledge to make sure that the tak-
ing of unreasonable risks is prevented or reduced as it burdens society
with high costs. For example, environmental experts give advice on how
to protect against the risks of flooding when living in flood-prone areas,
health experts advise pregnant women not to drink alcohol or smoke
during pregnancy, financial experts advise that we should invest in pen-
sion schemes to secure that we can have a decent lifestyle when retiring
from active work life. The major purpose of those actions is preventing
unreasonable risk-taking (and exposure to risk) and reducing the social
costs of such activities. Therefore, experts are often puzzled that all the
good knowledge and expert advice does not prevent people from wor-
rying about the wrong issues and exposing themselves to ‘unreasonable’
risks (Renn 2014).
However, there are many examples which show that available knowl-
edge is not always straight forward, and it is sometimes difficult to agree
which risks people can reasonably take or not. A particular domain of
concern and controversial debate is the sphere of risk-taking by young
people. The key issue is where to draw the line between dangerous
risk-taking that should be prevented, such as drink driving, unprotected
sex and illicit drug consumption. Or how such activities could at least
be reduced as much as possible such as becoming a regular smoker.
At the same time, it is widely acknowledged that learning to take risks
and to prepare for the possibility that risk-taking can turn out badly
is an essential part of adolescence. The social desire to protect young
4
J. O. Zinn
Asia oli niin, että Czarnieckilla oli hopeainen kitalaki sen jälkeen
kuin kuula oli vienyt hänen omansa. Kun hän oli liikutettu, vihainen
tahi levoton, niin hänen äänensä aina muuttui teräväksi ja
rämiseväksi.
— Ylhäissyntyinen… ylhäissyntyinen…
— Sitä etua ei kukaan voi herra Lubomirskilta riistää! — sanoi
Zagloba.
— En, sanoin sen vain siksi, että kieli ei kangistuisi suussa eikä
henki lakkaisi kulkemasta, mikä helposti tapahtuu, jos on liian kauan
vaiti. En ole häntä tuntenut enkä opettanut. Eikö minulla muka ole
ollut parempaa tekemistä kuin olla karhuntanssittajana ja opettaa
herra marsalkkaa asettumaan takakäpälilleen? Mutta se on
samantekevää. Siitä, mitä ihmiset hänestä kertovat, olen
huomannut, mikä hän on miehiään, ja minä osaan kyllä kyniä hänet
niinkuin keittäjätär kanan. Mutta yhtä asiaa pyydän sinulta: älä
mainitse sanallakaan, että minulla on kirje herra Czarnieckilta, älä
edes viittaa siihen suuntaan, ennenkuin itse annan sen.
Zagloba alkoi heti kertoa, mutta esitti asiat osittain toisin kuin ne
olivat olleet, sillä Kannenbergin joukko oli hänen mielikuvituksessaan
jo kasvanut kahdentuhannen miehen suuruiseksi, ja sen mukaisesti
hän kuvasi ruotsalaisten tappionkin.
— Herra Lubomirski!
— No, Jan?
— Voin vain sanoa sen, että suuni on yhä vielä auki ihmettelystä!
Kauan vielä puheli Zagloba tähän tapaan, sillä hän oli hyvin
tyytyväinen itseensä, ja semmoisissa tapauksissa hän oli tavallista
puheliaampi ja täynnä viisaita mietelmiä.
KUUDES LUKU.
— Kerro sinä, sillä tuo tuossa on päissään! Zagloba oli tosin jonkin
verran kallistellut pikaria. Mutta Skrzetuski vahvisti hänen puheensa
todeksi, ja Czarniecki oli aivan ällistynyt.
— Tässä.
— Hänkö? Hän nieli kaikki, mitä hänelle syötin. Luulin, että hän
räjähtää rikki riemusta kuin ruotsalainen kranaatti. Sen miehen voisi
imartelulla houkutella vaikka alas helvettiin.