Recalibrating Risk

 

Recalibrating Risk is a new book project kicked off in Fall 2012 featuring 16 authors from 6 different countries and several different disciplines, including law, history, psychology, sociology, public policy, political science, and economics.  Authors will explore oil spills in the US and Europe; nuclear events in Japan, the U.S. and Europe; and economic crises in the U.S and Europe.  The authors will look at overall themes across history, across geography and across types of crises.

Duke Co-investigators on this project include: Edward Balleisen, Associate Professor of History & Public Policy, Lori Bennear, Assistant Professor of Environmental Economics, Kim Krawiec, Professor of Law, Jonathan Wiener, Professor of Law, Public Policy, & Environmental Policy.

Authors held their first meeting to discuss initial drafts in September 2012 and will hold a second meeting in February 2012. Contributors include:

  • Elke Weber, Psychology and Columbia Business School, on cognitive heuristics, risk perceptions, and the impact of crises on those perceptions
  • Thomas Birkland and Megan Warnement, Political Science, North Carolina State University, on the political dynamics of focusing events
  • Frederick Mayer, Public Policy, Duke University, on narrative framing and agenda construction
  • Lori Bennear, Environmental Economics, Duke University, on the techniques of economic analysis for estimating distant and/or low probability risks of great potential magnitude
  • Carolyn Kousky, Economics, Resources for the Future, on the techniques of modern insurance for assessing and hedging fat-tailed risks
  • Marc Eisner, Political Science, Wesleyan College, on American regulatory responses to Santa Barbara and Exxon Valdez
  • Chris Carrigan, Political Science, University of Pennsylvania, on American regulatory responses to the BP-Deepwater Horizon oil spill.
  • Ole Andres Engen, Sociology, and Preben Lindoe, Risk Management, University of Stavanger, on European regulatory responses to North Sea oil spills
  • Michael Greenberg, Public Policy, Rutgers, on American regulatory responses to nuclear accidents at Three Mile Island, Chernobyl, and Fukushima
  • Ortwin Renn, Sociology, Stuttgart University, on German and French regulatory responses to nuclear accidents at Three Mile Island, Chernobyl, and Fukushima
  • Atsuo Kishimoto, Public Policy, National Institute of Advanced Science and Technology, Tokyo, on Japanese regulatory responses to nuclear accidents at Three Mile Island, Chernobyl, and Fukushima
  • Youssef Cassis, Economic History, European University Institute, on regulatory responses to the financial crises of the Great Depression in Britain, France, and the United States
  • David Sicilia, History and Business, University of Maryland, on regulatory responses in the United States and Western Europe to peripheral financial crises of the 1980s and 1990s
  • Barry Eichengreen, Economics, University of California at Berkeley, on regulatory responses to recent European sovereign debt crises
  • Bruce Carruthers, Sociology, Northwestern University, on regulatory responses to the recent Global Financial Crisis, focusing on the problem of asset valuation