ABSTRACT
A number of people, in a range of professions, are employed to take risk decisions, within legal contexts, to protect the public from harm. They rely upon the extensive research into, discussion of and policy development relating to risk, danger, etc, as demonstrated by this volume (see Nash 2006). A high proportion of that research seeks to enhance our ability to identify the people who are, and the occasions when they are, more or less dangerous. It involves traditional empirical research, where the significance of different factors are investigated and compared. It allows us to make some of the inductive inferences involved in risk predictions. Researchers can focus on ‘the risk’, but practitioners have to make decisions. Knowing about ‘the risk’ ‘in’ a particular person, setting or event, is certainly helpful. But it only informs part of the decision. Not only must practitioners draw upon risk factor research, based upon the behaviour of other people, in other settings, but they must apply it to their unique clients within the context of a particular setting and plan to implement, control and review their decision. Practitioners need guidance on risk decision-making, implementation, control and learning from review processes.
