Dr John Downer
Ma(Edin.), MPhil(Cantab.), PhD(C'nell)
Current positions
Senior Lecturer in Risk and Resilience
School of Sociology, Politics and International Studies
Contact
Media contact
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Research interests
I have broad interests in the nexus between science, risk and governance. My work focuses on issues relating to the nature of expert authority, and the role of experts in debates about environmental and technological risk. I work closely with the Science and Technology Studies (STS), and the Sociology of Knowledge literatures in this regard.
In previous work I have looked at engineering debates about testing, safety and regulation in the civil aviation and nuclear spheres. My current research focuses on the risks of complex technological infrastructures (particularly nuclear power), and on the technopolitics of environmental debates (particularly radiological pollution).
Projects and supervisions
Research projects
Regulatory requirements for evolving functionality in autonomous systems
Principal Investigator
Description
Existing regulation on the functionality of autonomous systems (what they are meant to do, what they do, and what they could do) is based on quasi-static design principles where technologies…Managing organisational unit
School of Sociology, Politics and International StudiesDates
01/04/2021 to 30/04/2024
UKRI Trustworthy Autonomous Systems Node In Evolving Functionality
Principal Investigator
Managing organisational unit
School of Sociology, Politics and International StudiesDates
01/11/2020 to 30/04/2024
Thesis supervisions
‘Bounding’ US Cybersecurity
Supervisors
Publications
Recent publications
31/01/2020Empires built on sand
Regulation and Governance
Homo Atomicus: An Actor Worth Psychologizing?
Behavioral Economics and Nuclear Weapons
On Ignorance and Apocalypse
Safety Science Research
Resilience in Retrospect
Law and the Management of Disasters:
The Aviation Paradox
Minerva