| 1. |
- Boholm, Max, 1982, et al.
(author)
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Dis-Ag-reement: the construction and negotiation of risk in the Swedish controversy over antibacterial silver
- 2015
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In: Journal of Risk Research. - : Informa UK Limited. - 1366-9877 .- 1466-4461. ; 18:1, s. 93-110
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- What constitutes a potentially hazardous object is often debated. This article analyses the polemic construction and negotiation of risk in the Swedish controversy over the use of antibacterial silver in health care and consumer products. This debate engages the media, government agencies, parliament and government, non-governmental organizations and companies. Texts and websites from these actors were studied using content analysis. Antibacterial silver is construed by some actors as a risk object with harmful effects on a series of objects at risk: the environment, public health, organisms and sewage treatment. In contrast, other actors deny that antibacterial silver is a risk object, instead construing it as mitigating risk. In such a schema, antibacterial silver is conceived of as managing the risk objects of bacteria and micro-organisms, in turn managing the risk objects of infection, bad smell and washing, and in turn helping the environment and public health (objects at risk). The structure of the debate suggests two basic modes of risk communication. First, antibacterial silver is construed as a risk object, endangering a variety of objects at risk, such as organisms, public health, the environment and sewage treatment. Second, this association between antibacterial silver and objects at risk is obstructed, by denying that antibacterial silver is a risk object or by associating silver with the benefit of mitigating risk.
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| 2. |
- Boholm, Max, 1982, et al.
(author)
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Risk Identification: A Corpus‐Assisted Study of Websites of Government Agencies
- 2020
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In: Risks, Hazards & Crisis in Public Policy. - : Wiley. - 1944-4079. ; 11:3, s. 242-269
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Government agencies have a key role in the regulation, management, and communication of risk. This paper explores how seven Swedish government agencies in the policy fields of (i) chemicals, (ii) civil contingencies, (iii) energy, (iv) environmental protection, (v) food, (vi) housing and buildings, and (vii) traffic identify risks on their websites. The relational theory of risk is used as an analytical tool to unpack risk identification. An analytical distinction is made between “risk objects,” that is, potentially harmful objects, and “objects at risk,” that is values at stake. The articulation of risk objects and objects at risk on government agencies’ websites is explored by using corpus linguistic techniques that reveal lexical and grammatical patterns of the word “risk.” The agencies identify an extensive assembly of risk objects of various kinds. The sets of risks identified are rather idiosyncratic and there is limited overlap between agencies. The identification of objects at risk is less varied and idiosyncratic than the identification of risk objects, were the agencies appear to be more in agreement. The findings are discussed in relation to the scope of risk identification; institutional explanations, and in terms of conditions for inter‐agency collaboration, identified as a key feature of effective risk governance.
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| 3. |
- Boholm, Max, 1982, et al.
(author)
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The many faces of nano in newspaper reporting
- 2012
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In: Journal of Nanoparticle Research. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 1388-0764 .- 1572-896X. ; 14:2, s. 722-740
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- The morpheme nano in languages such as Swedish and English is a constituent of many words. This article linguistically analyses the meaning potential of nano by focusing on word use in a Swedish newspaper corpus comprising 2,564 articles (1.6 million words) covering a 22-year period (1988–2010). Close to 400 word forms having nano as a constituent have been identified and analyzed. The results suggest that nano covers a broad and heterogeneous conceptual field: (i) as a prefix of the SI system; (ii) in relation to the scientific activities of nanoscience and nanotechnology, including their sub-processes and actors; and (iii) in relation to objects. The identified meanings of nano, besides the standard definition (i.e. ‘billionth part’ in relation to SI units), are ‘operating at the nanometre level’ in relation to activities and their actors and ‘nanometre sized’ and ‘nanotechnological’ in relation to objects; in addition, the less precise and non-technical meaning ‘very small’ is identified. We discuss the implications of the findings for a hypothesis about media influence on public understanding of technology, suggesting that repeated findings in Europe and the USA of little self-reported understanding and knowledge of nanotechnology or nanoscience among the public make sense in light of the polysemy of nano reflected in its broad variety of verbal forms and usages.
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| 4. |
- Boholm, Åsa, 1953, et al.
(author)
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Riskhanteringsbeslut inom transportsektorn: Slutredovisning av forskningsprojektet TRANSAM 2007-2010
- 2011
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Reports (other academic/artistic)abstract
- Inom transportsystemet fattas dagligen otaliga beslut om att hantera risker som hotar människors liv och hälsa, ekonomiska värden eller miljön. Bland beslutsfattarna återfinns statliga och kommunala myndigheter på olika nivåer, privata företag som trafikoperatörer, bygg‐ och konstruktionsentreprenörer och konsultfirmor. Frågor om risk och säkerhet hanteras ofta av grupper och nätverk bestående av privata och offentliga aktörer som samverkar för att utföra och planera offentliga verksamheter. Riskbeslut i infrastruktur‐ och trafikplanering fattas därför ofta gemensamt av aktörer med olika mål, värderingar och prioriteringar. Skiljaktigheter i uppfattningar och erfarenheter bidrar tillsammans med organisatoriska specialiseringar och myndigheters specialiserade sektoriella ansvarsområden och beslutskompetens till hög komplexitet i beslutsprocessen. Syftet med forskningsprojektet Riskhanteringsbeslut inom transportsektorn (2007‐2010), vid Centrum för forskning om offentlig sektor (CEFOS), Göteborgs universitet, har varit att bidra med ökad kunskap om beslutsfattande som sker i komplexa beslutssituationer i samverkan mellan offentliga och privata aktörer. Projektet har varit ett samhällsvetenskapligt mångdisciplinärt forskningsprojekt baserat på ämnesperspektiv från socialantropologi, statsvetenskap, offentlig förvaltning, företagsekonomi, riskforskning och kulturgeografi. Inom ramen för projektet har faktiska beslutsprocesser studerats i realtid och i de institutionella, sociala och politiska sammanhang de ingår i.
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| 5. |
- Bendz, Anna, 1967, et al.
(author)
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Drinking water risk management: local government collaboration in West Sweden
- 2019
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In: Journal of Risk Research. - : Informa UK Limited. - 1366-9877 .- 1466-4461. ; 22:6, s. 674-691
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Drinking water provisioning can be approached as a paradigmatic case of transboundary risk management that requires government collaboration. In Sweden, as in most other countries, the provision of safe drinking water and the control of its quality is a responsibility of local governments. This explorative case study investigates how local level decision-makers (politicians and public administrators) identify and understand risks to drinking water services; how they construe governmental responsibility and collaboration between local governments. The empirical results show that decision-makers identify a number of systemically interrelated technical, natural and social risks; that responsibility is understood to be complex and fragmented and that they refrain from collaboration despite clear advantages in theory. Even if the payoff is high from a broad societal perspective for inter-municipal collaborative risk management of drinking water services, collaboration on the local level is low. Institutional uncertainties relating to the allocation of responsibility, transaction costs and political costs for individual municipalities may explain the reluctance to collaborate in this case.
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| 6. |
- Bendz, Anna, 1967, et al.
(author)
-
Indispensable, yet Invisible: Drinking water management as a local political issue in Swedish municipalities
- 2020
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In: Local Government Studies. - : Informa UK Limited. - 0300-3930 .- 1743-9388. ; 46:5, s. 800-819
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Local policy-makers' incentives to address an issue is conditioned by how they perceive public attention. Our study focuses on drinking water management at the municipal level in Sweden. Provisioning and management of drinking water is a responsibility of the local governments. Interviews with local politicians and public administrators in seven municipalities reveal that local policy-makers think that citizens view provisioning of drinking water as a taken for granted service, and also lack knowledge of and interest in drinking water issues. Public attention is further seen as a double-edged sword since engagement in water issues often is a result of problems with water provision. The findings are discussed from a theoretical perspective of the role of agenda-setting in public policy. It is argued that the view of policy-makers of citizens as unengaged negatively affects the incentives to bring drinking water to a prominent place on the local policy agenda.
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| 7. |
- Binde, Per, 1956, et al.
(author)
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Schismogenesis in a Swedish case of railway planning
- 2004
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In: Facility Siting: Risk, Power and Identity in Land Use Planning / Boholm, Åsa, Löfstedt, Ragnar. - London : Earthscan. - 1844071464 ; , s. 160-176
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Book chapter (other academic/artistic)abstract
- The modernisation of the west-coast trunk line, approved by the Swedish government in the late 1980s, is the most substantial railway project in Sweden since the railway boom at the end of the nineteenth century. This investment, originally projected to cost SEK 40 billion (approx. 4.4 billion Euro), is part of an ambitious plan to modernise Swedish infrastructure to meet the needs of the twenty-first century in terms of efficiency and environmental sustainability. As to the more specific plans for rebuilding and relocating particular sections of the railway, there have been serious reservations, even fierce opposition, in communities along the proposed route. We take a close look at the debate concerning the West Coast Railway, as it has occurred in towns along the route, to discern features of the rhetorical logic of argumentation and also of its social nature as a process of discordant communication. In this, Gregory Bateson?s concept of schismogenesis will be used as an analytical tool.
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| 8. |
- Boholm, Åsa, 1953, et al.
(author)
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A relational theory of risk
- 2011
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In: Journal of Risk Research. - : Informa UK Limited. ; 14:2, s. 175-190
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- This paper outlines a relational theory of risk. According to this theory, risk emerges from situated cognition that establishes a relationship of risk between a risk object and an object at risk, so that the risk object is considered, under certain contingent circumstances and in some causal way, to threaten the valued object at risk. This relational theory of risk is a theory about the interpretative nature of risk that answers the key theoretical and practical questions of why and how something is considered a risk. The relational theory of risk allows for the interpretation of risk situations as culturally informed, and thereby suggests new ways to approach risk communication, risk governance, and risk management by taking into account bounded rationalities of thought and action.
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| 9. |
- Boholm, Åsa, 1953, et al.
(author)
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A relational theory of risk: lessons for risk communication
- 2014
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In: Effective risk communication. Red Joseph Arvai & Louie Rivers III. - London, New York & London : Routledge, Taylor & Francis, Earthscan. - 9781849712651 ; , s. 1-22
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Book chapter (peer-reviewed)
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| 10. |
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| 11. |
- Boholm, Åsa, 1953
(author)
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Anthropology and Risk
- 2015
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Book (other academic/artistic)abstract
- Drawing on theory from anthropology, sociology, organisation studies and philosophy, this book addresses how the perception, communication and management of risk is shaped by culturally informed and socially embedded knowledge and experience. It provides an account of how interpretations of risk in society are conditioned by knowledge claims and cultural assumptions and by the orientation of actors based on roles, norms, expectations, identities, trust and practical rationality within a lived social world. By focusing on agency, social complexity and the production and interpretation of meaning, the book offers a comprehensive and holistic theoretical perspective on risk, based on empirical case studies and ethnographic enquiry. As a selection of Åsa Boholm’s publications throughout her career, along with a newly written introduction overviewing the field, this book provides a unified perspective on risk as a construct shaped by social and cultural contexts.This collection should be of interest to students and scholars of risk communication, risk management, environmental planning, environmental management and environmental and applied anthropology.
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| 12. |
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| 13. |
- Boholm, Åsa, 1953
(author)
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Beslutsfattandets antropologi
- 2008
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In: Risk & Risici, red. J. Persson och N.-E. Sahlin. - Nora : Nya Doxa. - 9789157805188 ; , s. 249-268
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Book chapter (other academic/artistic)
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| 14. |
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| 15. |
- Boholm, Åsa, 1953
(author)
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CHRISTIAN CONSTRUCTION OF THE OTHER: THE ROLE OF JEWS IN THE EARLY MODERN CARNIVAL OF ROME
- 2015
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In: Journal of Mediterranean Studies. - 1016-3476. ; 24:1, s. 37-52
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- In Rome, for many centuries, it was mandatory for the city's Jews to take part in gross and degrading carnival spectacles. Making use of various historical records of such celebrations, this article explores the cultural construction of Jewish character within carnival against the background of religious ideas about Christian identity and alterity. In contrast to Christians, whose constitutions were believed to include a spiritual essence, or 'soul', Jews were construed to lack spirituality entirely. Learned churchmen have argued that Jews were unable to perceive the 'truth' of the doctrines of the Christian religion. Allowing themselves to be controlled by their bodies, unlike good Christians, they were viewed as being akin to beasts in human guise. But the Jew, according to this culturally determined view, not only furnished a caricature of what, according to Christian values, were vices, but also represented a real threat to the Christian community.
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| 16. |
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| 17. |
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| 18. |
- Boholm, Åsa, 1953
(author)
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Cultural theory
- 2018
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In: Companion to Environmental Studies. - : Routledge. - 9781138192195
-
Book chapter (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Companion to Environmental Studies presents a comprehensive and interdisciplinary overview of the key issues, debates, concepts, approaches and questions that together define environmental studies today. The intellectually wide-ranging volume covers approaches in environmental science all the way through to humanistic and post-natural perspectives on the biophysical world.
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| 19. |
- Boholm, Åsa, 1953
(author)
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Döden i Venedig. Karnevalen som ritual
- 1989
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In: Ritual og performance, ed. J Östergård-Andersen. - Århus : Kulturstudier 20, Center för Kulturforskning.
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Book chapter (other academic/artistic)
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| 20. |
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| 21. |
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| 22. |
- Boholm, Åsa, 1953, et al.
(author)
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Experts’ understandings of drinking water risk management in a climate change scenario
- 2017
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In: Climate Risk Management. - : Elsevier BV. - 2212-0963. ; 16, s. 133-144
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- The challenges for society presented by climate change are complex and demanding. This paper focuses on one particular resource of utmost necessity and vulnerability to climate change: namely, the provisioning of safe drinking water. From a critical perspective on the role of expertise in risk debates, this paper looks at how Swedish experts understand risk to drinking water in a climate change scenario and how they reason about challenges to risk management and adaptation strategies. The empirical material derives from ten in-depth semi-structured interviews with experts, employed both at government agencies and at universities, and with disciplinary backgrounds in a variety of fields (water engineering, planning, geology and environmental chemistry). The experts understand risk factors affecting both drinking water quality and availability as complex and systemically interrelated. A lack of political saliency of drinking water as a public service is identified as an obstacle to the development of robust adaptation strategies. Another area of concern relates to the geographical, organizational and institutional boundaries (regulatory, political and epistemological) between the plethora of public actors with partly overlapping and sometimes unclear responsibilities for the provisioning of safe drinking water. The study concludes that climate change adaptation regarding drinking water provisioning will require a new integration of the knowledge of systemic risk relations, in combination with more efficient agency collaboration based on a clear demarcation of responsibility between actors.
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| 23. |
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| 24. |
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| 25. |
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| 26. |
- Boholm, Åsa, 1953
(author)
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"Greater good" in transit: The unwieldy career of a Swedish rail tunnel project
- 2005
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In: FOCAAL - European Journal of Anthropology. ; 46, s. 21-35
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Large-scale technological projects are born as visions among politicians and leaders of industry. For such visions to become real, they must be transformed from a virtual existence in the minds of their creators to a reality that can be accepted, even welcomed, by the public, not least by the communities who will become neighbors to those projects. Democracy implies that political decisions over the expenditure of public funds should answer not merely to the partial interests of stakeholders but should be accountable to the 'greater good' of society at large. Since a technological project materializes in what Latour calls a 'variable ontology-world', the greater good associated with it can be expected to be dynamic and shifting. The Hallandsås railway tunnel in southwestern Sweden illustrates how the very premises of the project's organizational logic have changed over time, the discourse of the greater good moving from an economical focus to an environmental one.
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| 27. |
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| 28. |
- Boholm, Åsa, 1953
(author)
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Hyperkomplexitet i järnvägsplanering
- 2011
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In: Våra villkor I verkligheten. Den beskrivande ekonomin, red. T Polesie & E. Broniewicz. - Göteborg : BAS School of Management.
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Book chapter (other academic/artistic)
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| 29. |
- Boholm, Åsa, 1953, et al.
(author)
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Introduction
- 2004
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In: Faciltity siting: Risk, power and identity in land-use planning, eds. Boholm, Å. & Löfstedt, R. - London : Earthscan.
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Book chapter (other academic/artistic)
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| 30. |
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| 31. |
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| 32. |
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| 33. |
- Boholm, Åsa, 1953
(author)
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Lessons of success and failure: Practicing risk communication at government agencies
- 2019
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In: Safety Science. - : Elsevier BV. - 0925-7535. ; 118, s. 158-167
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- - The study looks at government agency officials’ experiences of what characterizes successful and failed risk communication. It is theoretically positioned within a practice based approach to risk communication and management as an organizational activity, or “risk work”. Risk work in organizations build on sense making, alignment to commonly agreed prudent practices, and learning from experience. The empirical method consists of interviews with practitioners working with risk communication at six government agencies in Sweden, in the policy areas of food, chemicals, environmental protection, housing and building, traffic, and contingency planning and management. The study identifies several factors that according to the practitioners contribute to success and failure of risk communication work practice: strategic planning and decision making; inter-organizational collaboration and assigning of responsibility, predominantly with other agencies but also with external stakeholders; scientific knowledge and understanding of risk issues; interactions with the media; alignment of risk management; and formulating and disseminating the message. An additional finding is the tendency of the practitioners to make attributions in terms of causal explanations, internal or external to the organization, of success and failure in performing risk communication. © 2019 The Author
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| 34. |
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| 35. |
- Boholm, Åsa, 1953
(author)
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Masked performances in the carnival of Venice
- 1994
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In: Images and enactments. Possible worlds in dramatic performance, eds, G. Aijmer & Å. Boholm. - Göteborg : IASSA.
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Book chapter (other academic/artistic)
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| 36. |
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| 37. |
- Boholm, Åsa, 1953
(author)
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Nanotechnology, Anthropomorphic Matter and Human Machinery: An Exploration of the Longue Durée of Technological Vision
- 2014
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In: ASA Online. Journal of the Association of Social Anthropologists. - 2073-4158. ; 1:09, s. 1-40
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- A growing global trend of emerging innovation, nanotechnology is associated with a host of hopes for a new era for humankind. Reminiscent of the preoccupation of medieval alchemy with uncovering the ultimate secret of how to master matter and spirit, the idea of ‘molecular manufacturing’ that characterizes the more radical visionary approaches in nanotechnology is oriented towards the discovery and engineering of the fundamentals of life and matter. A desire not only to design and develop ‘intelligent’ artefacts and tools imbued with cognitive faculties, but also to technologically enhance humans themselves to defy illness, ageing and ultimately death, has from its inception constituted a core element of visionary nanotechnology. By drawing a historical parallel with medieval alchemy, this paper identifies and discusses visionary elements of nanotechnology conceptions of what it means to be human in relation to materiality and artefacts. The unstable and eroding boundaries actualized by nanotechnology – between what is considered intrinsically natural, technological or human, and what is not – are addressed from theoretical perspectives in anthropology and philosophy that pertain to the cultural and social dimensions of technology, material agency and cognition.
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| 38. |
- Boholm, Åsa, 1953
(author)
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On the organizational practice of expert-based risk management: A case of railway planning
- 2010
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In: Risk Management. - 1460-3799. ; 12:4, s. 235-255
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- In government and business, there is a growing trend towards using standardized tools and guidelines under the assumption that formal approaches will make risk management effective and successful. However, studies of organizational practice show that risk and safety management is intuitive and experience based. The relationship between formal risk management and risk management as practice therefore needs critical assessment. This case study of railway planning found that, although risk identification and assessment was orchestrated according to a formal risk management protocol, the process was guided by practical reasoning based on expert, intuitive and socially situated knowledge drawing on experience. It is concluded that risk management needs to be contextualized from a practical organizational perspective in which responsibility, expertise, accountability, trust, coordination and communication are essential.
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| 39. |
- Boholm, Åsa, 1953, et al.
(author)
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Osäkerhetens representationer
- 2001
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In: Osäkerhetens horisonter, eds. Boholm, Å., Hansson S-O., Persson, J. & M. Peterson. - Nora : Nya Doxa.
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Book chapter (other academic/artistic)
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| 40. |
- Boholm, Åsa, 1953
(author)
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Path dependence and the ordering of expectations
- 2011
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In: Methods and models - used in the project Pathways to Sustainable European Energy Systems, red. F. Jonsson. - Mölndal : Alliance for Global Sustainability. - 9789197858526 ; , s. 59-62
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Book chapter (other academic/artistic)
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| 41. |
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| 42. |
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| 43. |
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| 44. |
- Boholm, Åsa, 1953
(author)
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Risk communication - a pragmatic approach
- 2007
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In: Communication - Action - Meaning. A Festschrift to Jens Allwood, eds. Ahlsén, E., Henrichsen, P. J., Hirsch, R., Nivre, J., Abelin, Å, Strömqvist, S. & Nicholson, S. - Göteborg : University of Gothenburg.
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Book chapter (other academic/artistic)
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| 45. |
- Boholm, Åsa, 1953
(author)
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Risk Communication as Government Agency Organizational Practice
- 2019
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In: Risk Analysis. - : Wiley. - 0272-4332 .- 1539-6924. ; 39:8, s. 1695-1707
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- The dynamics of organizational risk communication is an understudied topic in risk research. This article investigates how public officials at six government agencies in Sweden understand and relate to risk communication and its uses in the context of agency organizational work on policy and regulation. Qualitative interviews were used to explore the practitioners’ views on some key topics in the academic literature on risk communication. A main finding is that there is little consensus on what the goals of risk communication are; if, and how, uncertainty should be communicated; and what role is to be played by transparency in risk communication. However, the practitioners agree that dissemination (top down) to the public of robust scientific and expert knowledge is a crucial element. Dialogue and participation is used mainly with other agencies and elite stakeholders with whom agencies collaborate to implement policy goals. Dialogue with the public on issues of risk is very limited. Some implications of the findings for the practice of risk communication by government agencies are suggested.
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| 46. |
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| 47. |
- Boholm, Åsa, 1953
(author)
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Siting the West Coast Rail
- 2000
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In: National objectives - local objections: Railway modernization in Sweden, ed. Å. Boholm. - Göteborg : CEFOS.
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Book chapter (other academic/artistic)
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| 48. |
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| 49. |
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| 50. |
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