Risk governance within aviation

Abstract

Air traffic is global in nature. Regulation of the industry is therefore restrained by international recommendations and common rules. As a result of a comprehensive deregulation process, companies are able to conduct air traffic wherever they want, as long as they meet the demands of the regulators and the recommendations of the trade organisations. This article results from an exploratory case study examining the global risk governance that Norwegian civil aviation traffic is a part of. By using the concept of risk governance, this research underlines the importance of involving all relevant actors in aviation risk management. Specifically, the article highlights the relationship between national and supranational risk governance and the challenges this relationship poses for risk management. The results of this study show that the extensive numbers of actors grouped in different organisations pose both possibilities and challenges for the risk governance process within aviation – possibilities in the form of formal structures for participation, and challenges in the form of the integration and implementation of different contextual knowledge within the EU rule framework.