Key concepts incidents, damage, risks and uncertainty

The answers to the Minister s questions call for conceptual clarity. When concepts such as risk and incident are mentioned in the same breath, it becomes difficult to assess the nature and scale of the problem or the reference points for policy. In this document, we make a distinction between incidents, damage, risks and uncertainty. In other words, we differentiate between action leading to an actual violation of physical safety (incidents, how the consequences of that action (damage) are dealt with, and how relatively known and undisputed threats to safety (risks) are handled, as well as the safety issues arising from faulty knowledge and/or conflicting values, for which we use the collective term uncertainty .  

An incident is the actual violation of physical safety. We use this term as an overall concept to describe acute or rising emergencies within the realm of physical safety. They maybe emergencies that, prior to their advent, were considered more or less likely or unlikely to occur. However, the instant they do occur, the probability calculation becomes irrelevant. Until the eve of its occurrence, an incident can be referred to in terms of risk after it takes place, it helps us to estimate the likeliness of similar incidents in future while it is happening, however, the danger is very real. The emphasis is therefore on how politicians and public administrators deal with actual physical unsafety and the damage that it causes. 

At its most basic, risk in fact involves the question of when, where and to what extent unopportunities possibilities (see textbox 1.1) will become reality. If there is uncertainty in these respects, then a further question is whether the threats will become reality at all. During an incident, the point is to combat the actual violation of physical safety. In cases of risk and uncertainty, the point is to weigh up the opportunities and threats. The aim of risk and uncertainty management is to prevent or limit incidents and damage or to anticipate them. When an incident or damage cannot be prevented, the aim is to remedy physical unsafety. 

The vocabulary of opportunities and threats is more common beyond the specific literature on risk. It is a famihar term in the field of bodily injury and liability, however. It can be traced back to the Dutch Civil Code, which contains the following passage The Court may wholly or partly postpone the assessment of damage which has not yet occurred or, after an evaluation of the opportunities and threats, make an anticipatory assessment (itahcs added). ° 

In our conceptual framework, risk is defined as a calculable safety problem - calculable because the nature and scale of the potential danger, the probability of its occurring and its impacts are sufficiently known and undisputed. Risk can be expressed as the function of chance (probability) and consequence (impacts). The questions that public administrators and politicians face concern whether a risk is acceptable in the light of the associated opportunities, how the risk can be managed, and what role government should play in that scenario. 

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