1. The Risk Cycle: Three Interconnected Modes of Organizing Risk
Cynthia Hardy
University of Melbourne & Cardiff Business School
Steve Maguire
McGill University

2. Three modes of organizing risk
Prospective
Identifies the likelihood that events with negative effects will arise in the future, predict the nature and magnitude of these effects.
Aim is to predict and prevent risk by influencing what may happen
But, what do organizations do when hazards are not amenable to quantification/prediction?
Real-time
Deals with risks in real-time as they materialize
Aim is to control and contain risks as they emerge by influencing what is happening
But, what do organizations do when risks materialize in unexpected ways?
Retrospective
Investigates risk incidents to identify whether risks were managed appropriately
Aim is to review and revise: by ascertaining what did happen and what should happen
But, what do organizations do when the emphasis is on blaming individuals rather than organizational learning

3. The organizational risk cycle
Failure to contain risk as it materializes
Real-time:
Act on risk
Failure to prevent risk from materializing
Prospective:
Prepare for risk
Failure to learn and change how risk is organized
Retrospective:
Investigate previous risk

4. The Discourse of risk
Discourses are defined as collections of interrelated texts and practices “that systematically form the objects of which they speak” (Foucault, 1979: 49) 
Discourses provide a clear language “for talking about a topic and … a particular kind of knowledge about a topic” (du Gay 1996: 43) and clear meanings about who and what is ‘normal’ and acceptable
The interconnected texts and practices that constitute the discourse of risk privilege certain ‘risk ‘identities’, and the ‘risk knowledge’ produced by those identities that conforms to accepted procedures and protocols (Hardy & Maguire, 2016).
The discourse of risk results in a widely shared meaning that risk is “a tangible by-product of natural and social processes [that] can be objectively mapped, measured, and controlled, at least to the extent that science permits” (Jasanoff, 1998: 96)

5. The constraining effects of the discourse of risk
Prospectively
Produces expert risk knowledge derived from empirical information about the past, which is abstracted into causal/predictive models.
Privileges risk assessors/risk managers, scientific/technical knowledge
Real-time
Produces expert risk knowledge derived from empirical information about the past, which is abstracted into plans, scripts and protocols
Privileges risk arbiters/command-and-control;, managerial knowledge
Retrospectively
Produces expert risk knowledge derived from empirical information about the past, which is abstracted into a holistic, convergent but ‘notional’ account
Privileges risk adjudicators, forensic knowledge, blame.

6. Investigate previous risk
‘riskification’: more and more organizing in the name of risk
Resisting the discourse of risk: alternative forms of organizing
Real-time:
Act on risk
Improvization
Discipline
Prospective:
Prepare for risk
Precaution
Retrospective:
Investigate previous risk
Individualization
Intensification
Governmentality

7. Remember that risk looks to the past to manage the future
So, what can we do?
Remember that risk looks to the past to manage the future
In doing so, it can mislead us
Recognize that risk is a risky concept
Identify other discourses that we could use instead
Conduct more empirical studies of ‘problematizing’ practices in organizations
Be critical and practical in our research