Innovation, Learning, and Policy Evolution in Hazardous Systems

Abstract

This study examines learning processes within the policy networks of organizations and individuals that influence the management of hazardous technological systems. Innovations in science and technology—as well as operational experiences—create recurring opportunities for network members to learn new methods for enhancing the capabilities of system safeguards (defenses against system hazards). Networks can use institutional learning arrangements— structures, procedures, and customs that promote the search for safety improvements—to take advantage of these opportunities. Furthermore, networks can learn from system disasters. Such disasters can both reveal weaknesses in system safeguards and provide the impetus for the deployment of enhanced safeguards. The concepts developed here are examined through a case study of innovative learning arrangements used by a policy network that manages an environmentally hazardous system, the marine oil trade in the Prince William Sound region of Alaska.