Risk Language And Power

Risk, Language, and Power applies discourse analysis to public policy debates about nanotechnology to explore how risk is used in language and practice to frame those debates. The author argues that regulatory science by itself is inadequate to address risk concerns, and that public policy initiatives should be applied to broaden policy discourse around the environmental implications of emerging technologies.

Review: This book fills an important, but seldom explored, space between risk science and analysis, Science and Technology Studies, ethics, and public policy associated with the products of emerging technologies in the environment. Dr. Morris is both a scholar and practitioner, and as such, he carefully and insightfully calls for a paradigm shift in formulating regulatory policy for emerging technologies...I hope that policy makers, interested publics, and scholars alike will read this book to help us guide the future of emerging technologies in the environment. -- Jennifer Kuzma, Associate Professor of Science, Technology, and Environmental Policy; Humphrey School of Public Affairs, University of Minnesota Jeffrey Morris, occupying a unique position at the intersection of government action and scholarly reflection, argues that a discursive and formal risk regime formed in the age of chemicals is ill suited to address the possible health and environmental risks posed by nanotechnology.

His deft discourse analysis of the still-emerging nanotechnology risk regime is informed by direct experience, careful observation, and a subtle understanding of the role of quantitative regulatory science in shaping how we grapple with fundamental questions of risk, power, and democratic governance.

Morris's argument for a new and more reflexive discourse on risk and benefits before the existing regime is extended to nanotechnology by default commands our immediate attention. -- Christopher Bosso, Northeastern University