Fabienne Knudsen

Making sense of fishermen’s risk perception

Abstract In this paper we reflect on the possible reasons for the acceptability of risk in sea fishing and the implications they may have for safety actions and interventions. The data presented in the paper were collected during three trips at sea on fishing vessels in connection with a study of slips, trips and falls. The fieldwork offered an in situ insight into the way fishermen perceive their work and the risks they face, as well as their views of an outsider. Through empirical examples derived from our research and other studies, we show that fishermen’s risk perception can be explained by the need to adopt coping strategies, ie compromises and resilience in an environment marked by uncertainty and unpredictability. The difference between lay and expert knowledge is particularly salient in the case of safety researchers and fishermen. In order to make sense of the fishermen’s risk perception, we examine not only their working conditions, but also the conditions of our own knowledge of risk. The most important lesson to learn from our research and similar studies is that any improvement in fishermen’s safety must be planned and implemented in partnership with them.

The consequences of “culture’s consequences”: A critical approach to culture as collective programming applied to cross-cultural crews

In this article, it is claimed that research on cross-cultural crews is dominated by one specific understanding of the concept of culture, which is static, evenly distributed and context-independent. Such a conception of culture may bring some basic order while facing an unknown culture, but it may also have unintentional outcomes. It may lead to a deterministic view of other cultures, thereby reinforcing prejudices and underestimating other forms of differences; it risks blinding the participants of the specific context of a given communicative situation. The article opens with a critical review of the theory of Geert Hofstede, the most renowned representative of this theoretical approach. The practical consequences of using such a concept of culture is then analysed by means of a critical review of an article applying Hofstede to cross-cultural crews in seafaring. Finally, alternative views on culture are presented. The aim of the article is, rather than to promote any specific theory, to reflect about diverse perspectives of cultural sense-making in crosscultural encounters.