Hazard Management and Emergency Planning

CHAPTER 17

Hazard management and safety culture

NICK PIDGEON, BARRY TURNER, BRIAN TOFT and DAVID BLOCKLEY

 

Introduction

During the course of the twentieth century the second industrial revolution in Western society has been characterised by the rapid growth and in-stitutionalisation of large-scale technological systems. This growth has, in no small part, been due to the successful application of the physical sciences to a wide range of engineering problems. However, it is perhaps paradoxical that an apparently increased ability to control and manipulate the environment has raised a number of fundamental issues of safety and social acceptability. This is reflected in the fact that since the early 1970s the question ‘How Safe is Safe Enough?’, ...