The standard response to engineering disasters like the Deepwater Horizon case is to ascribe full moral responsibility to individuals and to collectives treated as individuals. However, this approach is inappropriate since concrete action and experience in engineering contexts seldom meets the criteria of our traditional moral theories. Technological action is often distributed rather than individual or collective, we lack full control of the technology and its consequences, and we lack knowledge and are uncertain about these consequences. In this paper, I (...) analyse these problems by employing Kierkegaardian notions of tragedy and moral responsibility in order to account for experiences of the tragic in technological action. I argue that ascription of responsibility in engineering contexts should be sensitive to personal experiences of lack of control, uncertainty, role conflicts, social dependence, and tragic choice. I conclude that this does not justify evading individual and corporate responsibility, but inspires practices of responsibility ascription that are less ‘harsh’ on those directly involved in technological action, that listen to their personal experiences, and that encourage them to gain more knowledge about what they are doing. (shrink)

For the purpose of this analysis, risk assessment becomes the primary term and risk management the secondary term. The concept of risk management as a primary term is based upon a false ontology. Risk management implies that risk is already there, not created by the decision, but lies already inherent in the situation that the decision sets into motion. The risk that already exists in the objective situation simply needs to be “managed”. By considering risk assessment as the primary term, (...) the ethics of responsibility for risking the lives of others, the environment and future generations in the first place comes into the forefront. The issue of risk heeding is especially important as it highlights the need to pay attention to warnings of danger and to take action to redress problems before disasters occur. In this paper, the decision making that led to the choice of technology utilized and the implementation of such technology in the case of the space shuttle Challenger disaster will be used as a model to illustrate the need to take ethical factors into account when making decisions regarding the safety of technological systems and the heeding of danger warnings. While twenty-five years separates the decision to launch the Challenger and the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant disaster, the lessons of the Challenger disaster are still to be learned. (shrink)

Explores the basic forms of responsibility that we willingly assume and the collaborative fulfillment that we find in each.