ABSTRACT
Scott Baker pointed out that 1983 NAS risk assessment/risk management paradigm attempted to limit values to the risk management side, preserving risk assessment as value free. However, he says each step involves “best professional judgment” which is subjective as well as objective, as he argues in some detail. Bryan Norton argued that risk assessment as a methodology “will never be adequate” to deal with all we ordinarily think of as risk. He emphasized particularly our limitations in using ecological risk analysis, and our problem of understanding long-term and large-scale events. Scientists and technical experts of all sorts who value reason and evidence highly are not often comfortable seeing themselves as stakeholders in public debates, and certainly not as having vested interests. However, the public will inevitably see risk experts as wedded to their methodology and not as the final authority on what social risks should be accepted.
