Environmental Quality and Governance
ENP 35806
Short Summary
Wageningen University
Anneli Janzer
1
, Lecture 1 – Risk Society and reflexive modernity
• Pollution and related health problems limited to the poor
→societal response: further modernization to increase wealth and reduce exposure to (environmental) risks
• Risk:
o Make the unforeseeable consequences of the actions of human civilization foreseeable
o Affect all people equally
• Beck argues that risk requires the disorganisation of existing state institutions because national
governments were not designed to deal with ubiquitous and commonly transboundary environmental
problems. Their design was focused on the accumulation and redistribution of welfare and to provide
security to a national citizenry.
• Institutional arrangements do not refer to governmental risk assessment and management only. It refers
to private norms, rules and standards that are also designed to minimize the effect of hazards (i.e. the
consequences of societal actions leading to human or environmental harm)
• Simple modernity
o Authority of science
o (Expert) scientists observe, measure and manage environmental problems
o We trust that scientists have no political motivation – objective and legitimate
o Under conditions of simple modernity, we think expert can solve risks and env problems
o We don’t question scientists
• Reflexive modernity
o Social practices (=daily routines) are constantly examined and reformed, due to new, incoming
information, reviewed through the alteration of those social practices
o =self contfrontation with the effects of risk society (vs. industrial society)
o only scientists are able to detect the new range of new “invisible” risks
o Knowledge of scientists becomes political as they determine what risks exist and how to deal with them
o Uncertainty increases: Who do we trust? →we question scientists
o Multiple opinions means risk becomes “argumentative” in science and society→everybody think they
are an expert
o High levels of public ignorance and low levels of public participation
o Global risk society, different countries with different interests=state no longer only responsible body
o emergence of multiple sources of knowledge and expertise that require new way of negotiation to reach
societal policies for changing practices and taking action to resolve complex problems
o New arenas of negotiation in distribution of “goods” and “bads”
• Sub-polity: Who is involved and what influence do they have?
▪ NGOs are cooperating with private companies=similar interest of problems, because state does
not take measures
• Sub-policy: What are the topics of action and what strategies of problem definition and solution?
• Sub-politics: How is power (re)distributed into new coalitions?
▪ politicians make bad decisions towards environment often times; often it is not the state that
changes things, but companies and NGOs/Interest groups that actually have a larger impact than
politics
• Notion of risk society still captures very clearly the way we live, although it is 30 y old
• De-monopolization of expertise
• Breakdown definition of and reliance on experts
• Informalisation of jurisdiction
• Participation conforms to social standards of relevance
• Opening the structure of decision making
• Participation in policy cycle key
• Creation of partial publicity
• Broad transformation of public dialogue, increased uncontrollability
2
ENP 35806
Short Summary
Wageningen University
Anneli Janzer
1
, Lecture 1 – Risk Society and reflexive modernity
• Pollution and related health problems limited to the poor
→societal response: further modernization to increase wealth and reduce exposure to (environmental) risks
• Risk:
o Make the unforeseeable consequences of the actions of human civilization foreseeable
o Affect all people equally
• Beck argues that risk requires the disorganisation of existing state institutions because national
governments were not designed to deal with ubiquitous and commonly transboundary environmental
problems. Their design was focused on the accumulation and redistribution of welfare and to provide
security to a national citizenry.
• Institutional arrangements do not refer to governmental risk assessment and management only. It refers
to private norms, rules and standards that are also designed to minimize the effect of hazards (i.e. the
consequences of societal actions leading to human or environmental harm)
• Simple modernity
o Authority of science
o (Expert) scientists observe, measure and manage environmental problems
o We trust that scientists have no political motivation – objective and legitimate
o Under conditions of simple modernity, we think expert can solve risks and env problems
o We don’t question scientists
• Reflexive modernity
o Social practices (=daily routines) are constantly examined and reformed, due to new, incoming
information, reviewed through the alteration of those social practices
o =self contfrontation with the effects of risk society (vs. industrial society)
o only scientists are able to detect the new range of new “invisible” risks
o Knowledge of scientists becomes political as they determine what risks exist and how to deal with them
o Uncertainty increases: Who do we trust? →we question scientists
o Multiple opinions means risk becomes “argumentative” in science and society→everybody think they
are an expert
o High levels of public ignorance and low levels of public participation
o Global risk society, different countries with different interests=state no longer only responsible body
o emergence of multiple sources of knowledge and expertise that require new way of negotiation to reach
societal policies for changing practices and taking action to resolve complex problems
o New arenas of negotiation in distribution of “goods” and “bads”
• Sub-polity: Who is involved and what influence do they have?
▪ NGOs are cooperating with private companies=similar interest of problems, because state does
not take measures
• Sub-policy: What are the topics of action and what strategies of problem definition and solution?
• Sub-politics: How is power (re)distributed into new coalitions?
▪ politicians make bad decisions towards environment often times; often it is not the state that
changes things, but companies and NGOs/Interest groups that actually have a larger impact than
politics
• Notion of risk society still captures very clearly the way we live, although it is 30 y old
• De-monopolization of expertise
• Breakdown definition of and reliance on experts
• Informalisation of jurisdiction
• Participation conforms to social standards of relevance
• Opening the structure of decision making
• Participation in policy cycle key
• Creation of partial publicity
• Broad transformation of public dialogue, increased uncontrollability
2
