ABSTRACT
The march towards more rules to manage safety seems to embrace a wide variety of hazardous activities. In all cases, safety management turns out to be driven by an increase in procedures, not only to cover a wider range of potential operational risks but also to rule operations at all organizational levels. The march towards proceduralization of safety is motivated by forces other than safety, particularly operational, social, economic, political and legal forces. When rules or procedures are written following a top-down process – which is still often the case – their limits are widely acknowledged: mismatch with real life, no leeway to let individual expertise be expressed. Acknowledging human error as inevitable and intrinsically linked to intelligence and performance, hence learning to live with it as safely as possible, helped reach beyond the chase to human error and enhance safety.
