Organized Uncertainty Designing a World of Risk Management

Author: Michael Power
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 9780199548804
Published In: November 2008
Format: Paperback , 272 pages
Jurisdiction: International ? Disclaimer:
Countri(es) stated herein are used as reference only

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Description
Contents
Author
Reviews

Details
- Shows that over the last decade risk management has become an increasingly important phenomenom in businesses and organizations
- Argues that this expansion is less to do with real dangers, and more to do with organizational accountability and legitimacy
- Extends and develops the arguments of Power's earlier, and highly influential, book The Audit Society (OUP, 1997)
- The signficance of this argument extends beyond management and accounting to public management, politics, and sociology
Since the mid-1990s risk management has undergone a dramatic expansion in its reach and significance, being transformed from an aspect of management control to become a benchmark of good governance for banks, hospitals, schools, charities, and many other organizations. Numerous standards for risk management practice have been produced by a variety of transnational organizations. While these many designs and blueprints are accompanied by ideals of enterprise, value production, and good governance, it is argued that the rise of risk management has also coincided with an intensification of auditing and control processes. The legalization and bureacratization of organizational life has increased because risk management has created new demands for proof and evidence of action. In turn, these demands have generated new risks to reputation.

In short, this important book traces the rise of the managerial concept of risk and the different logics and values which underpin it, showing that it has much less to do with real dangers and opportunities than might be thought, and more to do with organizational accountability and legitimacy.

Readership: Scholars and advanced students in Management, Accounting, Finance, Economics, Sociology, and Politics; Professionals and practitioners in Risk Management and Accounting
1: Organized Uncertainty: An Introduction
2: Turning Organizations Inside Out: The Rise of Internal Control
3: Standardizing Risk Management: Making Up Processes and People
4: Putting Categories to Work: The Invention of Operational Risk
5: Governing Reputation: The Outside Comes In
6: Making Risk Auditable: Legalization and Organization
7: Designing a World of Risk Management
Michael Power, Professor of Accounting and Research Director, ESRC Centre for Analysis of Risk and Regulation, London School of Economics and Political Science
"Power's book is illuminating and bringing in the foreground a highly relevant topic for today businesses and society. As a preliminary exploration of the ideas embodied by risk management understood as risk governance, the book is really worth reading even if we will be missing the flavor of field studies, because Power's aim was so broad and ideational. Anyway, this book may help debunk many ideas about risk and risk management, written by a talented management accountant and philosopher." - Laurent Magne, Society and Business Review

"...getAbstract recommends this informed and informative analysis to risk management professionals and professors who will appreciate Powers depth of knowledge." - getAbsract