大象传媒

The modern world is full of risks, from natural hazards such as flooding to the existential threat of nuclear war, artificial intelligence and climate change.

With the scientific and technological progress of the past few centuries, we鈥檝e created new hazards that threaten our very survival and in this series, emergency planner and disaster recovery expert Lucy Easthope explores the history of risk to find out how it鈥檚 understood, perceived and managed, and to ask how we can become more resilient as individuals, as a society and as a planet.

The theory of risk that emerged from the Renaissance and Enlightenment was based on the idea of the individual as rational and self-interested - 鈥榟omo economicus' - and decision-making as an objective science. But as Lucy Easthope discovers, risk is ultimately a subjective construct, and our perception of it is shaped not only by our psychology and feelings but by our beliefs and values.

Risk is political - which has a number of significant consequences for our management of risk, for if we can鈥檛 agree on the risks that face us as a society then how are we supposed to prevent these hazards from becoming a disaster?

Presenter: Lucy Easthope
Producer: Patrick Bernard
Executive Producer: David Prest
A Whistledown production for 大象传媒 Radio 4

Lucy Easthope is the co-founder of the After Disaster Network in the Institute of Hazard, Risk and Resilience at the University of Durham, Professor in Mass Fatalities and Pandemics at the University of Bath and the author of 鈥淲hen The Dust Settles鈥�.