Facing nonscalability: are risks still ‘risks’ when compound and catastrophic?

AbstractCrisis intensification and acceleration (e.g. the triple disaster in Fukushima, the COVID-19 pandemic, and the increase in extreme climatic events) have raised new challenges. Recent research went a step further by exploring new types of risks: compound risks. This article examines different definitions of compound risks and identifies their differences and common features. Starting from a definition restricted to the combination of natural hazards, the concept progressively unfolds to include a combination of hazards and local vulnerabilities, including the competition of different resources for mitigating their effects or the effects at different scales. Our article contributes to this theoretical effort. We explore how compound risks are envisioned in the current practices of preparation by actors in charge of risks management and crisis preparation, through 3 cases studies: medium size towns in France, Le Havre and Nantes, facing urban risks; a case study of the COVID-19 pandemic management at the French governmental level; and the doctrines in the case of a nuclear accident. Compound risks are understood in relation to scaling. The change of nature brought by a change of scale is explored through interdependencies, threshold, and rupture effects, which are intertwined with collapse. Are risks and risk management scalable? Compound risks consequences for political response are also studied. They may call for new types of governance, new modes of preparedness, and even new institutions. We conclude that compound risks question the very paradigm of risk management and crisis preparedness and may call for entirely new ways of facing extreme situations that question the very role and agency of politics.Keywords: Compound risksnonscalabilityrisk governanceclimate-related disasters AcknowledgmentsThe primary data for this study were collected through three different fieldworks and projects. The French cities’ data are from one of the author’s PhD research at Paris Est-University and benefited from financial and academic funding of its I-SITE. The Covid-19 data came from the ANR CrisOrg, funded by French Research Agency. Finally, nuclear related data and compound risks data were collected through the ‘UrbaRiskLab’ (URL) Project, funded by Gustave Eiffel University. We presented this work during the LATTS - RUE Seminar on February 8th 2023, and would like to thanks all the members for their helpful comments. Valérie November would like to thank John Stella who was the first to raise her attention on the notion of compound risks, leading to this paper. The views expressed herein are of course the authors’ own.GeolocationFranceDisclosure statementNo potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).Notes1 Leading to concern over the risks induced (Joey and Luscia Citation2021), fed by a scientific controversy (Ji et al. Citation2022; Nigel, Brendan, and Tony Citation2023).2 We use ‘governability’ here in a Foucaldian sense: not only the capacity to govern but also the capacity to be governed (Foucault Citation1978).3 The materials of the urban case study of Nantes and Le Havre are extracted from 2018–2021 PhD fieldwork that studied local risk and crisis management policies and tools (31 participatory observations and 72 semi-structured interviews mainly with local authorities and their “risk and crisis” department).4 Those maps are visible here: https://carto.sigloire.fr/1/n_tri_nant2014_044.map5 This case study was investigated within the ANR CrisOrg (Organisations in Crisis) project, which analyzed the responses to the COVID-19 crisis in France nationally (40 interviews conducted in different ministries, mainly Home and Health) and regionally and locally (55 interviews with public agencies, in Health and Civil Security). All the interviewees had high-level positions in their respective organisations.6 The material for the nuclear case is based on revisiting the data collected in the framework of a Franco–Japanese project (Institut de Radioprotection et de Sûreté Nucléaire [IRSN]/Institut d’Études Politiques de Paris [Sciences Po]/Tokyo Institute of Technology [Tokyo Tech]) and on interviews with experts and counter-experts of the domain. Interviews comprise governmental organizations (such as Japan Atomic Energy Commission, Reconstruction Agency, Cabinet office, etc.), local institutions (such as mayors from the Fukushima prefecture), NGOs (such as Group Action Hiroshima, Chirukin-sha, etc.). Complete list of interviews in the SHINRAI report (see: References).7 We prefer to use the term « government » when referring to the nuclear domain, following the claim made by Topçu that this technology is regulated in a very centralized, state based and authoritarian way (Topçu Citation2019).8 Interview of Genyù Sokiù, writer and director of Miharu temple. (Fukushima Prefecture). Led by C. Fassert and R. Hasegawa.9 Radionuclides have a decay period called ‘half-life’ corresponding to the loss of half of its radioactive potential.10 Junichiro Koizumi, Morihiro Hosokawa, Naoto Kan, Yukio Hatoyama, and Tomiichi Murayama. Letter to Ursula von der Leyen, January 27, 2022.