The challenge of Anthropocene risks

This contributing paper paper offers an analysis of the global COVID-19 experience and stepwise implementing consequences which will require a long-term effort involving scientists, decision-makers, and many more. The COVID-19 pandemic has been a stress test for global society, with implications that go beyond the field of global health risks. The paper argues that modern societies have developed risk governance systems that have achieved unprecedented successes in tackling conventional risks. These successes are based on a remarkable interface between science and society, combining mathematical representations of probability and utility with institutional advances in the formation of insurance markets and the development of regulatory networks. However, Covid-19 is a paradigmatic example of disaster risks where that interface, while still necessary, becomes misleading when treated as sufficient in its present form.

The study concludes that new kind of risks will require complementing the toolbox for the analysis, management and governance of conventional risks with new methods, concepts, and empirical data. And it will require a new role of science, not as the ultimate source of reliable knowledge, but as a partner in the co-creation of knowledge necessary to tackle Anthropocene risks.