Are the new safety paradigms (only) about safety and sufficient to ensure it? An overview and critical commentary

Abstract

Newly emerged concepts in safety and risk management, hereafter collectively named as new safety paradigms (NSPs), have challenged established practices and invite stakeholders to view their roles and safety initiatives from different angles. This article presents a critical commentary about various NSPs based on the combination of the concepts introduced in thirteen authoritative books and various peer-reviewed articles, including conceptual and opinion articles and scoping and systematic literature review papers. Our review suggests that NSPs predominantly present principles about effective organisational management with safety serving mainly as a proxy for organisational change rather than being the exclusive area of focus. Besides a few contradictions, most NSPs rely on generalisations and assumptions that can be invalid in the reality of dynamic and diverse organisational contexts. Further, most NSPs lack visible connections with more technical safety-related areas (e.g., process and fire safety), and they often reduce safety and human factors to an organisational psychology discipline. Nonetheless, this commentary does not discourage considering NSPs, as traditional safety management practices have also practical and scientific limitations. Rather, implementing NSP principles could offer valuable insights into improving organisational aspects, benefiting safety amongst other areas. However, the industry must refrain from approaching these paradigms as universally applicable solutions and deterministically. By recognising the limitations and nuances of any traditional or new paradigm, organisations could yield meaningful benefits while maintaining a holistic perspective on safety as a multidimensional field.