STATES OF EMERGENCY - Patrick Lagadec

Ph. Vesseron: The Seveso waste drums 103lucky enough to work for a minister who truly had a sense of what waspolitic and who didn't believe that worrying about her image in the shortterm was the best tack to take. Of course not everything can bemathematically calculated, and the primary function of political decisionmakingis to offer interpretations and strategies that aren't based solely onimmediate constraints. However, it would be very dangerous to let everyonepretend to be a minister and invent pseudo-"politic solutions" in order toavoid dealing with the ecological, technical, or industrial issues with whichwe are faced. As for the ministers, they usually understand that exercisingpower should not be confused with doing magic tricks. Otherwise they don'tlast very long.By letting each Land try to prove that it was the most diligent, ourGerman friends quickly demonstrated what kind of result you obtain intrying to reduce anguish by raising the stakes. Those in charge arediscredited, and the anguish, far from ebbing away, spreads and deepens.P.L.: So you would refuse the shock treatment. You would try, insofar aspossible, to remain rational.PH. VESSERON: Resolutely so. But rationality here means understandingthe risks involved in one decision or another. In the field of technologicalrisk, we have to act, explain, and show our fellow citizens that the strategyadopted really does suit their interests - all at once. Trying to be rationaldoesn't mean the only thing that counts is the problem's technical aspect.There's nothing magic about communicating and developing a strategy, evenif technology isn't the only issue. Basically, what seems important to me whenmaking a decision about a matter involving risks - and where you may beworried yourself - is not forgetting that you have to treat the people involvedlike adults, whose questions deserve to receive convincing answers.All-out responses, that promise total openness or zero risk, may of coursecreate some advantages and ease tensions. After all, nipping anguish at thebud has its own interest. You just have to remember that history is neverwritten in a single chapter. It's fine to handle the case of the waste fromSeveso, but it would be illusory to think that it will be the last industrial wasteproblem. It's fine to handle the consequences of a fire involving a PCBtransformer, but you mustn't forget that there will be others. If you begin topromise magic in order to get rid of one difficulty, a new event can arrivevery quickly and poke holes in the scenario you've constructed. This is afrightful vicious circle that makes each successive problem harder to solve.To the contrary, I think that from each event you should try to draw allpossible lessons that will improve your ability to anticipate.P.L.: So you think that even in a crisis, it is necessary to focus on the mostgeneral system and on the long term; it's always necessary to introduce alearning dimension and not treat exceptional circumstances as though theywere completely separate from everything else?PH. VESSERON: Technological risk is not a subject of daily concern to thepress and the citizen, and rightly so. If it were, we would limit ourselves to a