About this issue

In this issue of RCC Perspectives, a group of scholars reflect on Ulrich Beck’s influential Risk Society (1986). They seek to critically historicize the concept of risk society, considering how it might be a product of its particular time and place as well as what it means for public debate and scholarship in the early twenty-first century. Having met with Ulrich Beck in 2010, the authors discuss possible new lines of inquiry in relation to risk. The authors find many points of agreement with Beck but also qualify and contest his argument; in particular, the contention that our society is characterized by risk to a far greater extent than previous societies.

How to cite: Culver, Lawrence, et al., “Revisiting Risk Society: A Conversation with Ulrich Beck,” RCC Perspectives 2011, no 6. doi.org/10.5282/rcc/5587.

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Content

  • Introduction
  • Historicizing Risk by Lawrence Culver
  • On the Role of Natural Hazards and Catastrophes by Uwe Lübken
  • Compressed Cosmopolitanization by Stefania Gallini
  • Market Solutions? by Gordon Winder
  • Playing with Risk by Gijs Mom
  • Enforced Cosmopolitanization and the Staging of Risks by Heike Egner
  • Risk and Power by Cheryl Lousley
  • How Well does Risk Society Speak Beyond the Global North? by Agnes Kneitz
  • The Multiple Faces of Riskiness by Diana Mincyte