Handbook of Risk Theory

Sabine Roeser, Rafaela Hillerbrand, Per Sandin,

Martin Peterson (Eds.)

Handbook of Risk Theory

Epistemology, Decision Theory,
Ethics, and Social Implications of Risk
With 85 Figures and 62 Tables

Editors
Sabine Roeser (Editor-in-Chief)
Philosophy Department
Faculty of Technology, Policy and Management
Delft University of Technology
Delft
The Netherlands
and
Philosophy Department
University of Twente
Enschede
The Netherlands
Rafaela Hillerbrand
Human Technology Center
RWTH Aachen University
Aachen
Germany
Per Sandin
Department of Plant Physiology and Forest Genetics
Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
Uppsala
Sweden
Martin Peterson
Section for Philosophy and Ethics
Eindhoven University of Technology
Eindhoven
The Netherlands

ISBN 978-94-007-1432-8
e-ISBN 978-94-007-1433-5
Print and electronic bundle under ISBN 978-94-007-1434-2
DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-1433-5
Springer Dordrecht Heidelberg London New York
Library of Congress Control Number: 2011941145
Springer ScienceBusiness Media B.V. 2012
No part of this work may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means,
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Printed on acid-free paper
Springer is part of Springer ScienceBusiness Media (www.springer.com)

Preface
Risk has become one of the main topics in fields as diverse as engineering, medicine, and
economics, and it is also studied by social scientists, psychologists, and legal scholars. But the
topic of risk also leads to more fundamental questions such as: What is risk? What can decision
theory contribute to the analysis of risk? What does the human perception of risk mean for
society? How should we judge whether a risk is morally acceptable or not? Over the last couple
of decades, questions like these have attracted interest from philosophers and other scholars
into risk theory.
This handbook provides an overview into key topics in a major new field of research. It
addresses a wide range of topics, from decision theory, risk perception, to ethics and social
implications of risk, and it also addresses specific case studies. It aims to promote communication and information among all those who are interested in theoretical issues concerning risk
and uncertainty.
This handbook brings together leading philosophers and scholars from other disciplines
who work on risk theory. The contributions are accessibly written and highly relevant to issues
that are studied by risk scholars. We hope that the Handbook of Risk Theory will be a helpful
starting point for all risk scholars who are interested in broadening and deepening their current
perspectives.
The editors:
Sabine Roeser (Editor-in-Chief), Rafaela Hillerbrand, Per Sandin, and Martin Peterson

Acknowledgments
Sabine Roesers work for the Handbook of Risk Theory has been conducted at the philosophy
departments of TU Delft and Twente University and was sponsored by the Netherlands
Organization for Scientific Research (NWO), with VIDI-grant number 276-20-012.
Rafaela Hillerbrands work on this volume was supported by the excellence initiative of
the German federal and state governments and conducted at the Human Technology Centre
(HumTec) and the Institute of Philosophy, RWTH Aachen University. Thanks to all members
of the research group eet - ethics for energy technology for insights into risks from various
disciplines. Special thanks to Andreas Pfennig, Nick Shackel, and Peter Taylor for numerous
fruitful discussions on the topic.
Per Sandins work for this handbook was done in the Department of Plant Physiology and
Forest Genetics, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Uppsala and in the Department of
Philosophy and History of Technology, Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm.
Martin Peterson has conducted his work for the handbook at the philosophy department of
TU Eindhoven. Sabine Roeser and Martin Peterson are members of the 3TU. Centre for Ethics
and Technology, a center of excellence of the federation of the three technical universities in the
Netherlands (Delft, Eindhoven, and Twente).
We are very grateful to the contributors of this handbook. In addition, we would like to
thank Katie Steele, Linda Soneryd, and Misse Wester, each of whom provided expert reviews for
a chapter. We would like to thank the staff at Springer for the excellent collaboration, specially
Ties Nijssen, Jutta Jaeger-Hamers, and Christine Hausmann.

Table of Contents
Preface . . . . . . . . . .
Acknowledgments .
Editors . . . . . . . . . .
List of Contributors .

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. v
. vii
xiii
. xv

Volume 1
1

Introduction to Risk Theory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

Sabine Roeser . Rafaela Hillerbrand . Per Sandin . Martin Peterson

Part 1
2

General Issues in Risk Theory

A Panorama of the Philosophy of Risk . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27

Sven Ove Hansson

The Concepts of Risk and Safety . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55

Niklas Moller

Levels of Uncertainty . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87
Hauke Riesch

Part 2
5

Specific Risks

The Economics of Risk: A (Partial) Survey . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113

Louis Eeckhoudt . Henri Louberge

Interpretation of Forensic Evidence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135

Reinoud D. Stoel . Marjan Sjerps

Risks and Scientific Responsibilities in Nanotechnology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 159

John Weckert

Risk and Risk-Benefit Evaluations in Biomedical Research . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 179

Annette Rid

Understanding and Governing Public Health Risks by Modeling . . . . . . . . . 213

Erika Mansnerus

Table of Contents

10 Management of the Risks of Transport . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 239

John Adams

11 Risk and Spatial Planning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 265

Claudia Basta

12 Intergenerational Risks of Nuclear Energy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 295

Behnam Taebi

13 Climate Change as Risk? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 319

Rafaela Hillerbrand

14 Earthquakes and Volcanoes: Risk from Geophysical Hazards . . . . . . . . . . . . 341

Amy Donovan

Part 3 Decision Theory and Risk

15 A Rational Approach to Risk? Bayesian Decision Theory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 375
Claus Beisbart

16 A Philosophical Assessment of Decision Theory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 405

Karsten Klint Jensen

17 The Mismeasure of Risk . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 441

Peter R. Taylor

18 Unreliable Probabilities, Paradoxes, and Epistemic Risks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 477

Nils-Eric Sahlin

19 Paradoxes of Rational Choice Theory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 499

Till Grune-Yanoff

20 Multi-Attribute Approaches to Risk . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 517

Paul Weirich

21 Real-Life Decisions and Decision Theory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 545

John R. Welch

22 Social Influences on Risk Attitudes: Applications in Economics . . . . . . . . . . 575

Stefan T. Trautmann . Ferdinand M. Vieider

Table of Contents

Volume 2
Part 4

Risk Perception

23 Risk Intelligence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 603

Dylan Evans

24 Risk Communication in Health . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 621

Nicolai Bodemer . Wolfgang Gaissmaier

25 Risk Perception and Societal Response . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 661

Lennart Sjoberg

26 The Role of Feelings in Perceived Risk . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 677

Melissa L. Finucane

27 Emotion, Warnings, and the Ethics of Risk Communication . . . . . . . . . . . . . 693

Ross Buck . Rebecca Ferrer

28 Cultural Cognition as a Conception of the Cultural Theory of Risk . . . . . . . . 725

Dan M. Kahan

29 Tools for Risk Communication . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 761

Britt-Marie Drottz-Sjoberg

Part 5

Risk Ethics

30 Ethics and Risk . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 791

Douglas MacLean

31 Toward a Premarket Approach to Risk Assessment to Protect Children . . . . 805

Carl F. Cranor

32 Moral Emotions as Guide to Acceptable Risk . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 819

Sabine Roeser

33 Risk and Virtue Ethics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 833

Allison Ross . Nafsika Athanassoulis

34 Risk and Trust . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 857

Philip J. Nickel . Krist Vaesen

35 Risk and Responsibility . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 877

Ibo van de Poel . Jessica Nihlen Fahlquist

xi

xii

Table of Contents

36 What Is a Fair Distribution of Risk? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 909

Madeleine Hayenhjelm

37 Intergenerational Risks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 931

Lauren Hartzell-Nichols

38 The Precautionary Principle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 961

Marko Ahteensuu . Per Sandin

39 The Capability Approach in Risk Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 979

Colleen Murphy . Paolo Gardoni

Part 6 Risk in Society

40 Sociology of Risk . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1001
Rolf Lidskog . Goran Sundqvist

41 Risk and Gender: Daredevils and Eco-Angels . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1029

Misse Wester

42 Risk and Soft Impacts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1049

Tsjalling Swierstra . Hedwig te Molder

43 Risk and Technology Assessment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1067

Rinie van Est . Bart Walhout . Frans Brom

44 Risk Governance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1093

Marijke A. Hermans . Tessa Fox . Marjolein B. A. van Asselt

45 EU Risk Regulation and the Uncertainty Challenge . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1119

Marjolein B. A. van Asselt . Ellen Vos

46 Risk Management in Technocracy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1137

Val Dusek

Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1165

Editors
Sabine Roeser (Editor-in-Chief)
Philosophy Department
Faculty of Technology,
Policy and Management
Delft University of Technology
Delft
The Netherlands
and
Philosophy Department
University of Twente
Enschede
The Netherlands
Rafaela Hillerbrand
Human Technology Center
RWTH Aachen University
Aachen
Germany

Per Sandin
Department of Plant Physiology and Forest
Genetics
Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
Uppsala
Sweden
Martin Peterson
Section for Philosophy and Ethics
Eindhoven University of Technology
Eindhoven
The Netherlands

xiv

Editorial Board

List of Contributors
John Adams
Department of Geography
University College London
London
UK

Nicolai Bodemer
Harding Center for Risk Literacy
Max Planck Institute for Human
Development
Berlin
Germany

Marko Ahteensuu
Public Choice Research Centre (PCRC)
University of Turku
Turku
Finland

Frans Brom
Department of Technology Assessment
Rathenau Institute
The Hague
The Netherlands

Nafsika Athanassoulis
Oswestry
UK

Ross Buck
Department of Communication Sciences
University of Connecticut
Storrs, CT
USA

Claudia Basta
Section Philosophy
Delft University of Technology
3TU. Centre for Ethics and Technology
Delft
The Netherlands
and
Land Use Planning Group
Wageningen University and Research
Centre
Wageningen
The Netherlands

Claus Beisbart
Fakultat Humanwissenschaften und
Theologie
Institut fur Philosophie und
Politikwissenschaft
Technische Universitat Dortmund
Dortmund
Germany

Carl F. Cranor
Department of Philosophy
University of California
Riverside, CA
USA
Amy Donovan
Department of Geography
University of Cambridge
Cambridge
UK
Britt-Marie Drottz-Sjoberg
Risk Psychology, Environment and Safety
Research Group
Department of Psychology
Norwegian University of Science and
Technology (NTNU)
Trondheim
Norway

xvi

List of Contributors

Val Dusek
Department of Philosophy
University of New Hampshire
Durham, NH
USA

Louis Eeckhoudt
IESEG School of Management
Lille
France
and
The Center for Operations Research and
Econometrics (CORE)
Universite catholique de Louvain
Louvain
Belgium

Dylan Evans
School of Medicine
University College Cork
Cork
Ireland

Rebecca Ferrer
Behavioral Research Program
Division of Cancer Control and Population
Sciences
National Cancer Institute
Rockville, MD
USA

Wolfgang Gaissmaier
Harding Center for Risk Literacy
Max Planck Institute for Human
Development
Berlin
Germany
Paolo Gardoni
Zachry Department of Civil Engineering
Texas A&M University
College Station, TX
USA
Till Grune-Yanoff
Helsinki Collegium of Advanced Studies
University of Helsinki
Helsinki
Finland
Sven Ove Hansson
Division of Philosophy
Royal Institute of Technology
Stockholm
Sweden
Lauren Hartzell-Nichols
Program on Values in Society
University of Washington
Seattle, WA
USA

Melissa L. Finucane
East-West Center
Honolulu, HI
USA

Madeleine Hayenhjelm
Department of Philosophy
University College London
London
UK

Tessa Fox
Department of Technology and Society
Studies
Faculty of Arts & Social Sciences
Maastricht University
Maastricht
The Netherlands

Marijke A. Hermans
Department of Technology and Society
Studies
Faculty of Arts & Social Sciences
Maastricht University
Maastricht
The Netherlands

List of Contributors

Rafaela Hillerbrand
Human Technology Center & Institute for
Philosophy
RWTH Aachen University
Aachen
Germany
Karsten Klint Jensen
Danish Centre for Bioethics and Risk
Assessment
Institute of Food and Resource Economics
University of Copenhagen
Frederiksberg C
Denmark
Dan M. Kahan
Yale Law School
Yale University
New Haven, CT
USA
Rolf Lidskog
Centre for Urban and Regional Studies
Orebro University
Orebro
Sweden

Niklas Moller
University of Cambridge
Cambridge
UK
Colleen Murphy
Department of Philosophy
Texas A&M University
College Station, TX
USA
Philip J. Nickel
Department of Philosophy and Ethics
School of Innovation Sciences
Eindhoven University of Technology
Eindhoven
The Netherlands
Jessica Nihlen Fahlquist
Delft University of Technology
Delft
The Netherlands
and
Royal Institute of Technology
Stockholm
Sweden

Henri Louberge
Department of Economics
Geneva Finance Research Institute (GFRI)
University of Geneva
Swiss Finance Institute
Geneva
Switzerland

Martin Peterson
Section for Philosophy and Ethics
Eindhoven University of Technology
Eindhoven
The Netherlands

Douglas MacLean
Department of Philosophy
University of North Carolina
Chapel Hill, NC
USA

Annette Rid
Institute of Biomedical Ethics
University of Zurich
Zurich
Switzerland

Erika Mansnerus
Health and Social Care
London School of Economics
London
UK

Hauke Riesch
Judge Business School
University of Cambridge
Cambridge
UK

xvii

xviii

List of Contributors

Sabine Roeser
Philosophy Department
Delft University of Technology
Delft
The Netherlands
and
Philosophy Department
University of Twente
Enschede
The Netherlands
Allison Ross
London
UK
Nils-Eric Sahlin
Department of Medical Ethics
Lund University
Lund
Sweden
and
Center for Philosophy of Science
University of Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh, PA
USA
Per Sandin
Department of Plant Physiology and Forest
Genetics
Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
Uppsala
Sweden
Lennart Sjoberg
Center for Risk Research
Center for Media and Economic Psychology
Marketing and Strategy Department
Stockholm School of Economics
Stockholm
Sweden
and
Center for Risk Psychology, Environment,
and Safety
Department of Psychology
Norwegian University of Science and
Technology
Trondheim
Norway

Marjan Sjerps
Department of Science, Interdisciplinary
Investigations, Statistics, and Knowledge
Management
Netherlands Forensic Institute
The Hague
The Netherlands

Reinoud D. Stoel
Department of Science, Interdisciplinary
Investigations, Statistics, and Knowledge
Management
Netherlands Forensic Institute
The Hague
The Netherlands

Goran Sundqvist
Centre for Technology, Innovation and
Culture
University of Oslo
Oslo
Norway

Tsjalling Swierstra
Department of Philosophy
University of Maastricht
Maastricht
The Netherlands

Behnam Taebi
Department of Philosophy
Delft University of Technology
Delft
The Netherlands

Peter R. Taylor
Oxford Martin School
University of Oxford
Old Indian Institute
Oxford
UK

List of Contributors

Hedwig te Molder
Faculty of Behavioral Sciences, Science
Communication
University of Twente/Wageningen
University
Enschede/Wageningen
The Netherlands
Stefan T. Trautmann
Tilburg Institute of Behavioral Economics
Research
Department of Social Psychology & Center
Tilburg University
Tilburg
The Netherlands
Krist Vaesen
Department of Philosophy and Ethics
Eindhoven University of Technology
Eindhoven
The Netherlands
Marjolein B. A. van Asselt
Department of Technology and Society
Studies
Faculty of Arts & Social Sciences
Maastricht University
Maastricht
The Netherlands

Ferdinand M. Vieider
Institut fur Volkswirtschaftslehre
Ludwig-Maximilians-Universitat Munchen
Munich
Germany
Ellen Vos
Faculty of Law
Maastricht University
Maastricht
The Netherlands
Bart Walhout
Department of Technology Assessment
Rathenau Institute
The Hague
The Netherlands
John Weckert
Centre for Applied Philosophy and Public
Ethics (CAPPE)
Charles Sturt University
Canberra, ACT
Australia
Paul Weirich
Department of Philosophy
University of Missouri
Columbia, MO
USA

Ibo van de Poel

Delft University of Technology
Delft
The Netherlands

John R. Welch
Department of Philosophy
Saint Louis University, Madrid Campus
Madrid
Spain

Rinie van Est

Department of Technology Assessment
Rathenau Institute
The Hague
The Netherlands

Misse Wester
Division of Philosophy
The Royal Institute of Technology
Stockholm
Sweden

xix