John C. Chicken – författare

This book develops a comprehensive approach, known as the Ranking Technique, for the assessment of decision options. It aims to provide a way of presenting a decision maker with a consistent method of making a thorough assessment of all the factors associated with complex decisions. The Ranking Technique is based on a detailed analysis of all the issues involved and presents the results in a simple manner which should be understandable by the lay public not versed in the complexities of the issues involved. Ranking Technique is illustrated by application to four major decisions that have caused controversy and one fuel resource evaluation, although it is stressed that the Technique is applicable to all decision-making situations. The study describes how technical, economic and socio-political factors can be evaluated and their significance integrated to give a comprehensive assessment of the decision options.

This book gives decision-makers a logical overall philosophy of risk that will enable them to make sound and consistently defensible decisions about the acceptability of risk. The authors examine a variety of activities - as diverse as major industrial projects and medicine, finance and sport, transport and manufacturing - to identify the factors common to all determinations of risk acceptability, and develop a hypothesis about the aspects of risk that are universally acceptable.

Hazard Control Policy in Britain examines the general nature of Britain''s hazard control policy and the factors that appeared to influence its formation up to 1973, that is, prior to the implementation of the recommendations of the Robens'' Committee on Safety and Health at work. Attention is directed mainly at identifying the apparent roles and goals of the various organizations associated with policy making. Comprised of five chapters, this book begins with an overview of the nature of hazards and their technical causes, as well as the risks to life that they pose. Hazard control policy is then considered and a model of the policy making process is postulated. The role of interest groups in the policy-making process is also analyzed. Case studies that give a clear indication of the general nature of the hazard control policy-making process are presented, covering road transport, air transport, factories, nuclear power reactors, and air contamination. This monograph should be of value to policymakers involved in hazard control.

Nuclear Power Hazard Control Policy presents an analysis of the factors that appear to have influenced the formation and form of nuclear power hazard control policy in Britain. Particular attention is directed to those political groups that have developed a special interest in the problems of nuclear power, and to the interplay between organized groupings and public opinion generally. The metamorphosis of these groupings is traced from the origins of the nuclear industry in World War II to their prominent role during the Windscale Inquiry. This volume is comprised of nine chapters and begins with a simple account of the technical nature of nuclear hazards and of the legal and administrative framework that has been developed to control them. The subsequent chapters concentrate primarily on the influence exerted by social and political factors. Throughout the study, emphasis is given to the policy constraint imposed by increased expectations in the form of demands for higher standards of living, as well as improvements in the quality of the environment. The final chapter describes a model of the policy-making system that takes account of the consequences of variation with time in the environment surrounding the system. Appendices are included to provide a chronology of the relevant events and a summary of the administrative arrangements that various countries have made to control the safety of nuclear reactors. This monograph will be of value to policymakers concerned with the hazards of nuclear power and how to control them.