Risk, safety and corporate culture Managing occupational hazards in the modern business environment

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A novel approach to reducing uncertainty : the group Delphi

A variation on the conventional Delphi was used to assemble an informational summary of expert opinion regarding the risks involved with the application of sewage sludge to farmland. The aim was to reduce uncertainties surrounding the associated health and environmental risks so agreement among citizens, farmers, and regulators could be reached. An expert panel was assembled for one day to take part in a structured communication process modeled after the Delphi. A two-part questionaire using Likert scaling and open questions was iterated among rotating subgroups to build consensus and define disagreement. Plenary discussions were held between iterations to foster peer review. There was consensus about the risks of heavy metals, pathogens, and nutrients; but clear disagreement about the risk of organic toxins. Existing state regulations were deemed inadequate only for lead and some organic toxins. Expert quantitative ratings were found to differ radically for two hypothetical contexts: academic and public

Public participation in decision making : a three-step procedure

This article introduces a novel model of public participation in political decisions structured in three consecutive steps, the model is based on the view that stakeholders, experts and cItizens should each contribute to the planning effort their particular expertise and experience. Stakeholders are valuable resources for eliciting concerns and developing evaluative criteria since their interests are at stake and they have already made attempts to structure and approach the issue. Experts are necessary to provide the data base and the functional relationships between options and impacts. Citizens are the potential victims and benefactors of proposed planning measures, they are the best judges to evaluate the different options available on the basis of the concerns and impacts revealed through the other two groups. The three-step model has been developed and frequently applied as a planning tool in West Germany. We compare this experience with the model's first application in the United States, and conclude that the three-step procedure offers a limited, but promising future for democratizing policy making in the United States