The Risk Society and Beyond

Ulrich Beck's best selling Risk Society established risk on the sociological agenda. It brought together a wide range of issues centering on environmental, health and personal risk, provided a rallying ground for researchers and activists in a variety of social movements and acted as a reference point for state and local policies in risk management. The Risk Society and Beyond charts the progress of Beck's ideas and traces their evolution. It demonstrates why the issues raised by Beck reverberate widely throughout social theory and covers the new risks that Beck did not foresee, associated with the emergence of new technologies, genetic and cybernetic. The book is unique because it offers both an introduction to the main arguments in Risk Society and develops a range of critical discussions of aspects of this and other works of Beck.

Introduction - Barbara Adam and Joost van Loon Repositioning Risk: The Challenge for Social TheoryPART ONE: RECASTING RISK CULTURERisk or Angst Society? - Alan Scott Two Views of Risk, Consciousness and CommunityRisk Culture - Scott LashRisk, Trust and Scepticism in the Age of New Genetics - Hilary RosePART TWO: CHALLENGING BIG SCIENCENuclear Risks - Alan Irwin, Stuart Allan and Ian Welsh Three ProblematicsGenotechnology - Lindsay Prior, Peter Glasner and Ruth McNally Three Challenges to Risk LegitimationHealth and Responsibility - Elisabeth Beck-Gernsheim From Social Change to Technological Change and Vice VersaPART THREE: MEDIATING TECHNOLOGIES OF RISKChild Organ Stealing Stories - Claudia Castaneda Risk, Rumour and Reproductive TechnologiesLiturgies of Fear - Howard Caygill Biotechnology and CultureVirtual Risks in an Age of Cybernetic Reproduction - Joost van LoonPART FOUR: P(L)AYING FOR FUTURESInformation, Instantaneity and Global Futures Trading - Deirdre BodenDiscourses of Risk and Utopia - Ruth LevitasRisk Society Revisited - Ulrich Beck Theory, Politics and Research Programmes