Journal of Risk Research – Call for Papers for a special issue on “Intersectional Analysis of Risk”

In the last decades, the concept of risk has spread into almost all kinds of societal domains. The original focus on technical and environmental risks has transferred to areas such as health, crime, regulation, social inequality, public and social policy, and global risk as well as the management of risks in everyday life and intimate relationships. Scientific advances and the global media have together created a long string of alarms about risks of different magnitude: from more recent the Covid 19 pandemic, job atomisation and climate change, to terrorist threats, famine and migration, but also health and food related risks. The distribution and impact of these risks are not equal, instead they tend to follow and reinforce already existing structural inequalities. Structural inequalities are increasing and vulnerable groups and individuals being at risk have become major themes within current debates about human rights politics (see for example UN, 2020).

In the wake of this development, we have seen a growing body of feminist and intersectional approaches in the study of risk (Hannah-Moffat & O’Malley, 2007). The two perspectives inform each other: On the one hand, the intersectional perspective advance risk research by clarifying how new complexities in the reproduction of social inequalities brought about by globalization and the intersections between social class, gender, ethnicity, and other social categorisations, are connected to the production of risks. Risk research, on the other hand, inform intersectional analysis by clarifying the mechanisms in risk governance that are reproducing old inequalities (i.e., class and gender) and producing new inequalities (Giritli Nygren et al, 2020). Risk in this context is seen as inherently political and powerful or, as Mary Douglas (2002: 44) put it, 'Risks are always political'.

This call for papers on the theme of "Intersectional analysis of risk" is intended to indicate insights and viewpoints from scholars regarding intersectional analyses of risks associated with inequality on an individual, group or community level, including analyses of individual perception and behaviour, policy, mass media and discourses. We invite conceptually and/or empirically innovative research which can contribute to risk and intersectional research and theory development.

Submission process and timeline

• Completed full manuscript submissions for the special issue are due by January 31, 2023. Manuscripts should be sent to the guest editor via e-mail: susanna.ohman@miun.se.
• Authors need to ensure that their submissions fully comply with the author guidelines of the Journal of Risk Research.
• The guest editors will perform an initial screening of the submitted papers, and the most promising ones will then undergo a standard double-blind review procedure.
• It is anticipated that the special issue will be published in early 2024.

References

Douglas, M. (2002). Risk and Blame. Essays in Cultural Theory. Routledge.

Giritli Nygren, K, Olofsson, A & Öhman, A. (2020). A Framework for Intersectional Risk Theory in an Ambivalent World. Palgrave Macmillian.

Hannah-Moffat, K. & O’Malley, P. (2007) (eds.) Gendered Risks. Routledge.

UN. (2020). World Social Report 2020. Retrieved January 12, 2022.