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Annexe 2:“Risk Society”The research of German sociologist Ulrich Beckfocuses primarily on the problems of modern-daysociety. In 1986, he was the first to introduce theconcept of “risk society” in his book Risk Society:Towards a New Modernity. 58) Here he argues thatthe Western world is headed for a new kind ofmodernity in which the welfare state will distributerisks rather than riches. His thesis is that our fightfor daily bread has disappeared in favour of a conflictover how to avoid certain hazardous futurescenarios. Beck primarily focuses on ecological risks(his book was published shortly after the accidentat Chernobyl) but he also examines other kinds ofrisks found in this new modernity.The new modernity is characterized by havingbecome reflexive. When it was formerly orientedtowards making use of nature (the industrial revolution),it is today primarily occupied with dealing withthe problems caused by these technological andeconomic developments. As a result, according toBeck, modernity itself has caused the risks of ourtime.Thus Beck repudiates the idea of developmentautomatically resulting in progress. Instead, he pointsout that in the wake of development follows difficulty.The more social and industrial developments wecreate, the more difficult it becomes for the individualhuman being to understand and orient himselfin a still more complex world. Knowledge and sciencehave constituent roles in the risk society becausethe risks we are subjected to are often invisible orincomprehensible for the man in the street. Thiscould be, for instance, toxic foodstuffs and environmentalpollution which only expert knowledge andspecial theories, measuring instruments andtechniques can uncover.Beck is aware that risks in themselves are nothingnew. The new in this is, he claims, that risks are createdby society and therefore they are no longer justsomething that nature subjects us to at random, suchas earthquakes or strokes of lightning. When, for instance,the Rhine overflows, it is not just a consequenceof heavy rain, it is also because streams in thearea have been straightened out and the wetlandsthat were formerly capable of retaining large amountsof water have been drained, and perhaps even coveredover with asphalt, causing the water to drain fasterand thus flood the river all at once.While the word risk formerly had a ring of courageand adventure, today, it makes us think of self-destruction.The risks of our times pose a global threat accordingto Beck, and they are the consequence ofthe exponentially growing productive forces in themodernization process. Modernization has becomeits own enemy.According to Beck there is a connection betweenthe production of risks and decision-making. Thereason for this is that the socially created naturaldisasters are dependent on the decisions we make.This means that we make greater demands on ourdecision-makers’ knowledge and know-how than everbefore. Thus politics achieve new content and newmeaning – it becomes more technocratic as wellas geared towards avoiding problems, but it alsobecomes more exposed to spontaneously arisingrumours. Therefore Beck thinks than one consequenceof the risk society is that good argumentswill determine success, cf. the section on illusionpreparedness.58) Ulrich Beck, Risk Society: Towards a New Modernity (translated from the German by Mark Ritter) (1986; London: Sage, 1992)28 R E A C T I O N S T O T H E P A C E O F C H A N G E
Annexe 3:Judgement StalledGlobal trade is increasing significantly which meansthat it is impossible to keep track of the origin of thethings we surround ourselves with, or the food weeat. Many foodstuffs cross five or six borders beforethey reach the consumer.Discussions of salmonella DT 104, taste, ecologyand animal welfare have in the course of the past fiveto ten years become daily fare at the dinner table.We may taste and smell as much as we please, butwhether the level of pesticides is above the normalvalue, or there are heavy metals in the potatoes orgenetically engineered soy beans in the sauce arematters that are hard for us to say.Buying tomatoes in the supermarket is an exampleof the problems our judgement is faced with. The reddest,largest tomatoes with the best keeping qualitiesare perhaps those we put ourselves most at risk byeating. (The Danish Food and Drug Administrationclaims that as a general rule the more food is processedand the longer its shelf-life is, the more additivesit contains). Radiation, crop sprays and geneticengineering. The consumers must either ignore theambiguous expert statements or the evidence oftheir own senses.There is not even clarity in the areas where researchprojects have been carried out over severalyears. Experts continue to discover more, or emphasizemore sides to this, thus shifting the focus: Evenafter many years’ growth in ecological productionand trade, we should think that ecology would bebetter for the environment and for human beingswho could stop eating fertilizers and crop sprays.But oh no. This is far from the truth. As recent asFebruary 1, 2000, research professor at the DanishRoyal Veterinary and Agricultural University pointedto the fact that ecologically grown plants are morestressed than sprayed ones, and that stressed (!)plants secrete secondary carcinogens and that therecould be no doubt that a great deal of the occurrencesof cancer in the population is caused by thesesecondary carcinogens.So what is one to believe in these matters ofhealth and optimum methods of cultivation?And concerning environmentally-safe materials:A so-called “environmentally-safe” toxin, glyphosate,which is supposed to break down before seepinginto our ground water reserves was during 1999found in several ground water wells. 59)A career for rumoursIn January 2000, a story about the farmers and wadingbirds indigenous to the marshland of Southern Jutlandmade the Danish news. The birds are disappearingfrom the area and Danish environmental organizationswant the Danish state to take charge of thearea because they think that intensive farming hascaused the birds to disappear. The farmers claim thatthe government officials are at fault. The NationalForest and Nature Agency, Denmark, acknowledgesthat farmers have taken good care of the marshlandfor 500 years, but that they are now ruining it withintensive farming. The farmers hold the oppositeview and claim to be experienced and have an interestin looking after the marshland including the birds,and that the problems are therefore caused by theheavy-handed attempts of the state to “re-establish”the area, which have resulted in a drainage of thefields.The Danish Agricultural Advisory Centre foundthat the environmental organizations and the authoritieshad too little documentation for their strategy(getting the birds back by removing the farmers’cattle). And now the case is up in the Parliamentwaiting for the politicians to make a decision!Former principal of the Danish Forestry CollegeErik Oksbjerg takes this further and claims thatcaring for nature has gone too far, politically andfinancially. His opinion about a limitation of fertilizersis that “far more nitrogen should be used in thefields in order to establish a topsoil capable of withstandingthe percolation of rainwater. Instead welisten to Dutch and American fanatics …The DanishSociety for the Conservation of Nature and theMinistry of Environment and Energy thrive and growon pending disasters…sensational untruths.” 60) Inconnection with these views, Erik Oksbjerg’s positionin the debate of the endangered biodiversity andwhat to do about it is “that as soon as the tiniestthing is missing, be it a plant or an insect, all environmentalorganizations go on red alert…”C O P E N H A G E N I N S T I T U T E F O R F U T U R E S S T U D I E S59) Article entitled “Miljøsikker gift i vandet” [Environmentally-Safe Toxin Found in Drinking Water] in Danish newspaper Berlingske Tidende,January 11, 2000.60) Danish newspaper Berlingske Tidende, September 28, 1999.M E M B E R S R E P O R T 1 / 2 0 0 029
Page 1 and 2: 12 0 0 0Members ReportCOPENHAGENINS
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