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Comparative, collaborative, and integrative risk governance for emerging technologies

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Abstract

Various emerging technologies challenge existing governance processes to identify, assess, and manage risk. Though the existing risk-based paradigm has been essential for assessment of many chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear technologies, a complementary approach may be warranted for the early-stage assessment and management challenges of high uncertainty technologies ranging from nanotechnology to synthetic biology to artificial intelligence, among many others. This paper argues for a risk governance approach that integrates quantitative experimental information alongside qualitative expert insight to characterize and balance the risks, benefits, costs, and societal implications of emerging technologies. Various articles in scholarly literature have highlighted differing points of how to address technological uncertainty, and this article builds upon such knowledge to explain how an emerging technology risk governance process should be driven by a multi-stakeholder effort, incorporate various disparate sources of information, review various endpoints and outcomes, and comparatively assess emerging technology performance against existing conventional products in a given application area. At least in the early stages of development when quantitative data for risk assessment remain incomplete or limited, such an approach can be valuable for policymakers and decision makers to evaluate the impact that such technologies may have upon human and environmental health.

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Acknowledgements

The authors were participants in the “Risk Policy Forum on Key Enabling Technologies” hosted by the Society for Risk Analysis, and Ca Foscari University, Venice, Italy, on March 2017. This workshop and paper were part of a SRA New Initiative Project. The authors thank the conference attendees and panelists that drove discussions, as well as Emily Wells for her editorial assistance, and George Shephard for his figure design assistance. The views expressed within this paper are solely the opinions of the authors, and are not necessarily representative of their organizational affiliations.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Risk & Decision Science Team, Environmental Risk Assessment Branch, US Army Engineer Research and Development Center, 696 Virginia Road, Concord, MA, 01742, USA

    Igor Linkov, Benjamin D. Trump & Edward Perkins

  2. European Commission, Joint Research Centre, Antwerp, Belgium

    Elke Anklam

  3. Center for Genetic Engineering in Society, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC, USA

    David Berube & Jennifer Kuzma

  4. European Nanomedicine Laboratory, Grenoble, Rhone-Alpes, France

    Patrick Boisseasu

  5. Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, 639798, Singapore

    Christopher Cummings

  6. Institute for Risk and Uncertainty, University of Liverpool, Liverpool, UK

    Scott Ferson

  7. IRGC, Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland

    Marie-Valentine Florin

  8. University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA, 15261, USA

    Bernard Goldstein

  9. Ca’Foscari University of Venice, Venice, Italy

    Danail Hristozov & Antonio Marcomini

  10. National Research Centre for the Working Environment, Copenhagen, Denmark

    Keld Alstrup Jensen

  11. European Commission, Brussels, Belgium

    Georgios Katalagarianakis

  12. University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA, USA

    James H. Lambert

  13. Society for Risk Analysis, McLean, VA, USA

    James H. Lambert

  14. University of California at Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA, USA

    Timothy Malloy

  15. Malsch TechnoValuation, Utrecht, The Netherlands

    Ineke Malsch

  16. UMR ESPACE and UMR LAMSADE PSL, CNRS, Paris, France

    Myriam Merad

  17. CICPSI, Faculdade de Psicologia, Universidade de Lisboa, Lisboa, Portugal

    José Palma-Oliveira

  18. Institute for Advanced Sustainability Studies, Potsdam, Germany

    Ortwin Renn

  19. Arizona State University, Tempe, Arizona, USA

    Thomas Seager

  20. Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh, UK

    Vicki Stone

  21. National Exposure Research Laboratory, US Environmental Protection Agency, Washington, DC, USA

    Daniel Vallero

  22. National Institute for Public Health and the Environment (RIVM), Utrecht, The Netherlands

    Theo Vermeire

Authors
  1. Igor Linkov
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  2. Benjamin D. Trump
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  3. Elke Anklam
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  4. David Berube
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  6. Christopher Cummings
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  9. Bernard Goldstein
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  13. Jennifer Kuzma
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  14. James H. Lambert
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  15. Timothy Malloy
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  16. Ineke Malsch
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  17. Antonio Marcomini
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  18. Myriam Merad
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  19. José Palma-Oliveira
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  21. Ortwin Renn
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  22. Thomas Seager
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  23. Vicki Stone
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  24. Daniel Vallero
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  25. Theo Vermeire
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Correspondence to Igor Linkov.

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Linkov, I., Trump, B.D., Anklam, E. et al. Comparative, collaborative, and integrative risk governance for emerging technologies. Environ Syst Decis 38, 170–176 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10669-018-9686-5

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