Risk Communication - A refreshed consideration of the value of past theory and practice

A few weeks back, I had the pleasure of spending some time with the eminent guru on Risk Communication, Peter Sandman and his wife Jodi, who have both been key contributors to the literature and practice of Risk Communication, a key part of our work in impact assessment. It was lovely to see Peter again, a mentor of mine since the late 1980s and whose work has greatly influenced my practice in SIA and community engagement.

Sharing time with Peter and Jodi and fellow risk communication practitioners (including the lovely Piers Gillespie in our social team) brought back to me the importance of working effectively with companies and communities on the risks and impacts of relevance to them. An opportunity to reflect on Peter’s academic and consulting career in this space, made me ponder some of the work that I have undertaken with clients over the years, that have been willing to take our advice and adopt some of Peter’s risk communication principles by:

Acknowledging past problems
Sharing control
Engaging meaningfully and integrating local knowledge
Precautionary advocacy - raising outrage to facilitate greater discussion of key impacts and issues
Understanding community perceptions of risk and experiences of impact
Sharing the dilemma in listening for better impact management and enhancement solutions
Developing trust and being accountable

Many of these clients were early pioneers in embracing a different approach to the then norm of working with communities and could even be considered ‘bold’ in facilitating social impact programs to proactively identify and better understand impacts from the perspectives of the communities in which they were working.

Consequently, my evening with Peter, has reinvigorated me to reach out and call for better risk communication and engagement practice across industry to deliver improved project design, assessment process and outcomes for both the environment and people. Let’s dust off those Sandman resources and see how this work can be better applied today.

In working with communities around the country we hear communities continually assert: Benefits, benefits, benefits! But how will environmental and social impacts of your Project be appropriately managed? And it’s a valid question.

Impacts of any form of project development are a reality and are even more salient when the pace, scale and magnitude of change combine. While many community members across the country recognise the positives that development brings; there is still a need and a requirement for potential risks and impacts of such development to be appropriately managed.

In relation to the RE transition, our rural and regional communities are likely to bear the brunt of the transition - arguably in both a positive and negative way, but it’s going to take people working together to achieve the community value that is promised and to ensure that the necessary plans and strategies are in place to reduce the negative impacts of such development to the greatest extent possible; as we know well in the SIA space, impacts are not always evening distributed.

The ‘whole is much more than the sum of its parts’ (Aristotle), so multidisciplinary involvement, integrated assessment processes, and a stronger appreciation of how people view risk and impact is essential to finding appropriate impact solutions – whether that be mitigation or enhancement.

Edgar Shein (2013)[1] in his discussion of facilitating ‘Humble Inquiry’ noted:

“…we cannot hope to understand and work with people from different occupational, professional and cultural backgrounds if we do not know how to ask questions that build relationships that are based on mutual respect and the recognition that others know things that we may need to know in order to get the job done…Building such relationships between humans is a complex process. The mistakes we make in conversations and the things we think we should have said after the conversation is over all reflect our own confusion about the balance of asking and telling, and our automatic bias is toward telling. The missing ingredient in most conversations are curiosity and willingness to ask questions to which we do not already know the answer”.

If we reflect on these words momentarily, we can see that we have become very good at telling communities what we think they need to know, rather than asking what they would like to know and providing them a genuine voice in the process. Sara Bice[2] discussed this notion of ‘presumed benevolence’ of industry proponents in a recent article, where she outlined how it is assumed that projects will be inherently welcomed by communities due to their environmental benefits; however, this presumption can overlook the importance of genuine engagement and trust-building. As Bice noted:

When we recognize that even with a societal level SLO for climate action and the energy transition, local SLOs may be lacking, we see clearly the challenge before us and the urgency and necessity of grassroots work. Work that acknowledges our diverse frames. Work that attempts to understand and empathize with those of others. Work which seeks not to expect that acceptance will come because of top-down pressure but that it must be built up. Work characterised by respect, integrity and a flexibility to invent and apply new technical solutions that meet the values and expectations of the communities whose generosity will deliver all of us a sustainable planetary future.

Consequently, many of the solutions to effective change, lie in the communities that are most likely to be affected by and experience that change. Coming back to Peter and his early and enduring risk communication practice, we need to be asking questions and listening better, fostering relationships based on interest in others; involving those most affected in our planning processes; better understanding how communities perceive risks and impacts; and working collaboratively on appropriate solutions to better manage change.

Going back to a phrase I coined several years ago, ‘it’s not rocket science, but it is social science’, and we need to be ensuring that experienced social scientists and practitioners are centrally involved in facilitating community engagement and SIA in project planning and decision-making from the get-go.

So, thank you Peter for equipping us to continue to facilitate dialogue around effective risk communication and to highlight that while talking openly and honestly about risk and impact is important, it is not enough – companies have to do something about impact and back up their words with actions, with communities a central player in identifying appropriate solutions.

- Dr Sheridan Coakes, Executive Social Division and Marketing

[1] Schein, E. H. (2013). Humble Inquiry: The Gentle Art of Asking Instead of Telling. San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler Publishers.

[2] How presumed benevolence will short circuit the energy transition – NextGen Engagement