Empowerment: A fundamental tenet of risk communication and the Nimby syndrome
- SAIC, Idaho Falls, ID (United States)
Why do people want to be involved in decisions that have the potential to affect their community? Why not-wouldn`t you? The answer seems to obvious that it makes the question appear naive and trite. Yet, for years, government agencies and corporations have behaved in a manner that assumed the correctness of decisions and forced local residents to prove a right to be heard and to fight for the courtesy of respect. To the surprise and growing irritation of organization officials, the degree of trust and acceptance residents have for organizational pronouncements and activities has eroded into a seemingly intractable impediment. Given this environment, it is significant that two veins of social science research, risk communication and rhetorical theroy analyzing the Not-In-My-Back Yard (NIMBY) Phenomenon, are converging to the same point. Both approaches are finding that citizen empowerment--the legitimate intellectual sovereignty and meaningful involvement of individuals in decision making processes--is essential to the success of either type of communicative interaction. An appropriate context must precede the content in risk dialogue.
- OSTI ID:
- 127302
- Report Number(s):
- CONF-9504179--
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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