The Reconstitution of Risk Objects

Abstract

This paper examines the relationship of risk and power through a critical analysis of Crew Endurance Management, an initiative directed at enhancing maritime safety and efficiency. The paper argues that the initiative applies rhetorics of choice and self‐discipline to unite morality with risk, thus casting merchant mariners as risk objects in the shipping industry. This objectification relies on differentials in power rooted in differentially‐valued discourses that delegitimize some kinds of expertise. At the same time, deploying alternative rhetorics keyed to the anxieties of other levels of society allows risk objects to resist their objectification by shifting the relevant social scale for considering risk. The paper concludes by suggesting that imperatives for both productivity and safety will expand the workspace by expanding, through emphasis on personal choices, the environment in which workers must be concerned about risk reduction.

Keywords:

• Risk objects
• social construction of risk
• crew endurance management

Acknowledgement

The author thanks Dr. Michael McGuire, Dr. Melina Patterson, Dr. April Kendra, and the anonymous reviewers for their comments and suggestions on various drafts of this paper.

Notes

1. The subject of the captain's drinking is controversial. The NTSB (1990) cited it as a factor in the grounding; however, the captain was acquitted of charges of operating a vessel while intoxicated (Pagano, 1998). The watch officer on duty at the time of the grounding had had little sleep in the previous 24 hours, and had worked for much of the day prior to the accident. Furthermore, he stayed on watch longer than his schedule required to allow another officer time to sleep longer (NTSB, 1990). According to the NTSB report, at the time of the grounding, there were no well‐rested navigation officers aboard Exxon Valdez.

2. USCG (2005: 60) reported that dietary changes were indeed related to the presence of an onboard, committed cook.

3. The “Yellow Book” (GCMA, 2000) was a collection of mariners' descriptions of excess working hours.

4. Mostert (1974) in his book Supership recounts stories of fatigue from the ship's captain.

5. In its CEM recommendations for deep‐draft shipping, the USCG reports on variations in the standard four hours on/eight hours off watch rotation that has been practised aboard ship for many years. The test subjects varied their schedule to be on watch for a two‐hour interval and a six‐hour interval. On two vessels crewmembers were able to get plenty of sleep on this schedule (over ten hours in some instances, though there were days with only two, three, or four hours of sleep); on a third vessel, which had unpredictable movements in and out of port, the test was suspended due to accumulating fatigue. It should be noted that the report implies that the two vessels spent several days underway between port calls (USCG, 2001: III–7). Aboard such vessels the fatigue problem is generally much less acute than on vessels on coastwise runs with frequent port stops.