Lee Clarke

Panic: Myth or Reality?

Images of group panic and collective chaos are ubiquitous in Hollywood movies, mainstream media and the rhetoric of politicians. But, contrary to these popular portrayals, group panic is relatively rare. In disasters people are often models of civility and cooperation.

Prosaic Organizational Failure

We use the case of the now-dead Shoreham Nuclear Power Station to pose some questions, and a few answers, about organizational failure. The analysis centers on the symbolism of organizational plans, specifically how organizations use plans to justify increasingly complex systems to themselves and to others. That such plans are based on sparse or nonexistent experience, and that they are often wildly unrealistic, suggests some reasons why high-technology, high-risk systems do not foster organizational learning.

Explaining Choices Among Technological Risks

I address the issue of the process through which some risks, rather than others, are defined as acceptable. The predominant view, based on psychological research, is summarized and then criticized for taking insufficient account of the structural context within which decisions are made concerning risks. I then use evidence from the history of nuclear power, the unsafe Ford Pintos, and an instance of toxic chemical contamination to develop a more sociological perspective on acceptable risk. The analysis is grounded in organizational theory and centers on decision making processes regarding technological risks.

The Origins of Nuclear Power: A Case of Institutional Conflict

This history of the first 16 years of civilian nuclear power in the United States reveals that government agencies (the Atomic Energy Commission and the Joint Congressional Committee on Atomic Energy) struggled to create the industry so that military nuclear capabilities would advance. I show why these agencies were intent on developing civilian nuclear power, why utilities were reluctant to invest in nuclear power, and why the utilities eventually relented to the governments demands. This evidence is inconsistent with previous explanations of nuclear development, and I propose an institutional perspective that more adequately accounts for the governments success in forcing utilities to participate in an unprofitable and uncertain venture.

Politics and bias in risk assessment

Abstract Whereas formal risk assessments can rationalize decision making in organizations, political and other biases remain. This article examines the origins of risk analysis in conflicts of political interest. The history of probabilistic risk analysis in the nuclear industry illustrates the problem. This involves the nexus between experts and political judgment (focusing on expert behavior in the wake of Chernobyl), and the connection between risk analysis and ideology in decision making (focusing on the issue of deliberate deception in risk assessment).

Elites and Panic: More to Fear than Fear Itself

Attributions of panic are almost exclusively directed at members of the general public. Here, we inquire into the relationships between elites and panic. We review current research and theorizing about panic, including problems of identifying when it has occurred. We propose three relationships: elites fearing panic, elites causing panic and elites panicking. We use numerous examples, including our own research on the 2001 anthrax attacks in the United States, to illustrate how these relationships operate. The argument is evocative, not definitive. However, the conceptual utility of explicitly theorizing the relationships between elites and panic shows, among other things, how power works in disasters.

Drs. Pangloss and Strangelove Meet Organizational Theory: High Reliability Organizations and Nuclear Weapons Accidents

These are not the worst of times, but things are pretty bad. Hurricanes explode houses in Florida while floods make houses in the U.S. midwest into houseboats. Even larger floods kill thousands of people in Nepal and a huge earthquake sends monstrous tsunamis to terrorize Japan. Meanwhile, technological threats loom large in our future, especially in Russia and Eastern Europe. Russia still operates Chernobyl-like nuclear plants, claiming it is too expensive to close them, and even plans to build more. The reactor design is inherently unstable, and there is no containment shell around it. The question is not if but when another meltdown wretches radioactivity to the skies.

Speaking with One Voice: Risk Communication Lessons from the US Anthrax Attacks

It is often said that in times of crises experts, officials, and organizations should speak with one voice. But this homily has not been subjected to either conceptual or empirical scrutiny. We begin those tasks in this paper. To pursue our analysis, we use statements from the popular and scholarly presses; we also use our interviews with local officials in New Jersey, USA, who had to respond to the anthrax attacks in the fall of 2001. We outline some of the meanings of the admonition to speak with one voice and discuss the rhetorical significance of the advice. Our argument is that it may be wise to speak with one voice, but this can not be taken for granted. Difference audiences may well need different messages or different kinds of messages. Speaking with multiple voices is often the most effective way to advance meaningful communication.

Using Disaster to See Society

Disaster research was once perceived as key to the central concerns of sociology. In 1920, Samuel Henry Prince published Catastrophe and Social Change, which was less significant as an empirical study of the Halifax disaster than for gleaning general sociological insight from extreme events. Twenty years later, Sorokins Man and Society in Calamity made that approach broader and deeper by trying to use the great range of catastrophes that befall people to understand forms of psychic orientation and the shapes of social change. More recently, Kai Eriksons Everything in Its Path trod the same path, using Buffalo Creek to make general points about community, meaning, and trauma. There are other examples. As sociology splintered and specialized, the idea that catastrophe could inspire broad insights seems to have been lost, though some professional disaster researchers always knew it was there. Still, it is generally true that disasters and perceived disasters have come to be seen as special and exotic. That is a mistake. Disasters and failure are

POST-KATRINA GUIDING PRINCIPLES OF DISASTER SOCIAL SCIENCE RESEARCH

Sociological Spectrum Mid-South Sociological Association Publication details, including instructions for authors and subscription information: http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/title~content=t713666965 POST-KATRINA GUIDING PRINCIPLES OF DISASTER SOCIAL SCIENCE RESEARCH Duane A. Gill a; Lee Clarke b; Maurie J. Cohen c; Liesel A. Ritchie d; Anthony E. Ladd e; Stephen Meinhold f; Brent K. Marshall g a Mississippi State University, b Rutgers University, c New Jersey Institute of Technology, d University of Colorado, e Loyola University New Orleans, f University of North Carolina Wilmington, g University of Central Florida,