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The evolution of risk communication has been described as a series of communication strategies. This article suggests that organizational theory provides another dimension to understanding the evolution of risk communication, and that risk communication can be seen as an organizational adaptation of chemical manufacturers to external pressure. Following the tragedy in Bhopal the chemical manufacturing sector's loss of legitimacy led to destabilization of its authority and to increased uncertainty in its external environment. Risk communication was one means to increase legitimacy, thereby decreasing uncertainty and potential impact on resources. However, although risk communication may evolve from crises of legitimacy, the concept of "isomorphism"—conformance to norms within a corporate sector—predicts this need not be the case.

11 pages ; The perceptions of "public" members of participation processes have been studied far more than those of agency personnel. To improve the practice of public participation, this study, using Q analysis, explores how personnel from one agency view their experience, expertise, and learning with regard to communication with the public, including but not limited to public participation. Without organizational learning, which is more than the aggregation of individual learning, inferences from history will be lost. We found two perspectives: the Enthused ("Tiggers"), who focus on the support they receive for communication activities, including learning, and the Constrained ("Eeyores"), who see the limitations of their program and their own learning. The differences in the perspectives were not associated with agency unit, level of hierarchy, communication training, or tenure in the agency. We suggest ways to promote interchange among these participants through double-loop learning, which has similarities to the interactive, recursive processes that can integrate analysis and deliberation.

Relatively few studies have examined risk communication with the public from the viewpoint of the staff of institutions attempting such communications. This paper reports results of interviews with managers and staff of the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, on their programs' current and ideal communications with the public. Q analysis revealed two orthogonal perspectives on current program communications, the Enthused and the Constrained views. The primary focus of their divergence was on the matter of commitment and support for such communications. The Enthused group felt that they had attitudinal support from program culture and managers; the Constrained group focused on the lack of concrete operational support in terms of time, money, and expertise. These differences between the two groups did not appear to be associated with gender, managerial status, education, communication training, or organizational unit. When ideal program communications were discussed, the focus was on the need for all kinds of commitment and support (i.e., culture, managers, time, money, building expertise through training), as well as on more proactive and responsive communication. Both perspectives agreed that communication with the public is essential to their programs' success, trying new ways to communicate is worthwhile, scientific bases for decisions are not compromised by communication, and communication is not delegated to specialists. While varying ideas were held of the public's capacity and interest in communication, citizens were largely not held responsible for communication problems.

Pollutant emissions or ambient levels are often justified by reference to a higher benchmark, such as a public health standard or permit limit. However, does this risk comparison persuade the public audiences to whom it is frequently directed that such pollution levels are "acceptable"? A substantial proportion of people living within one mile of New Jersey's industrial facilities, perhaps as much as half, is indeed reassured by a comparison to such benchmarks. Positive attitudes toward discharge limits were linked to speaking English at home; positive attitudes toward drinking water standards were associated with seeing local benefits of industry as outweighing its risks, not speaking English, and relative youth (49 years old or less). Three scenarios involving drinking water contamination varied pre‐ and post‐treatment levels of the pollutant, though all post‐treatment levels were below the standard. In all cases great concern was expressed, with no significant differences across scenarios; net benefits, being white, and non‐English speaking were linked to lower concern. Relative trust seems a better explanation of different attitudes toward benchmark comparisons than varying levels of knowledge, but both hypotheses have drawbacks that merit further testing. These results imply that people with negative views of industry or government, the ones officials might most wish to reassure, will tend to doubt that regulatory benchmarks offer a valid risk comparison.

The prospect of industrial accidents motivated the U.S. Congress to require in the Clean Air Act of 1990 that manufacturing facilities develop Risk Management Plans (RMP) to submit to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) by July 1999. Industry worried that the requirement to communicate to the public a "worst‐case scenario" would arouse unnecessary and counterproductive fears among industry neighbors. We report here the results of focus groups and surveys with such neighbors, focusing particularly upon their reactions to messages about a hypothetical worst‐case scenario and management of these risks by industry, government, and other parties. Our findings confirmed our hypotheses that citizens would be skeptical of the competence and trustworthiness of these managers and that this stance would color their views of industrial‐facility accident risks. People with job ties to industry or who saw industrial benefits to the community as exceeding its risks had more positive views of industrial risks, but still expressed great concern about the risk and doubt about accident management. Notwithstanding these reactions, overall respondents welcomed this and other related information, which they wanted their local industries to supply. Respondents were not more reassured by additional text describing management of accidents by government and industry. However, respondents did react very positively to the concept of community oversight to review plant safety. Claims about the firm's moral obligation or financial self‐interest in preventing accidents were also received positively. Further research on innovative communication and management of accident risks is warranted by these results, even before recent terrorist attacks made this topic more salient.

The role of risk communication and public participation in environmental and public policy decision making has significantly increased over the last 15 years and remains an important social policy issue. In spite of this emphasis, government officials and participants in the process continue to struggle with what makes for "good" public participation. This study used two frameworks—one theoretical and one participant‐based—to evaluate two U.S. Army Restoration Advisory Boards (RABs). The theoretical framework explores the extent to which the RABs facilitate Habermas's idealized conditions of speech as related to fairness. Not surprisingly, we found that the two RABs do not consistently foster the idealized aspects of fairness suggested by Habermas. The participant‐based criteria were elicited through interviews with participants from the various stakeholder groups represented on the RAB, direct observation of RAB meetings, and a review of RAB‐related documents. We found that participants' value outcomes (the results of participatory processes) and not just the process itself, which is the focus of the theoretical framework. We also found that participants in the various stakeholder groups had different perceptions of the goals of the participatory process, which were closely related to their notions of success. Our results illustrate both the complexity and importance of using multiple frameworks for evaluating participatory efforts and the need for more systematic evaluation.