Centro de Documentacion de Fundación MAPFRE - Human- and work-centred safety : keys to a new conception of management

MAP20071500068

Human- and work-centred safety : keys to a new conception of management / Michel Llory

Conference presented at the 13th International Ergonomics Association Triennial Congress, IEA'97. This was held in Tampere, Finland, June 29-July 4, 1997. The Congress was hosted by the Nordic Ergonomics Society and the Finnish Ergonomics Society

By introducing Kuhn's historical concept of the paradigm, an attempt is made to define the present state of knowledge in the field of safety. In other words, what is called the safety paradigm is the group of safety-related concepts, theories, methods and empirical ideas now dominant. Today this paradigm has proved its coherence and efficiency; but it also has limitations, particularly as regards industrial accidents and the functioning of high-risk systems. That is, the difficulty of integrating fundamental aspects of human factors, such as the organizational factors and phenomena, and the subjective contribution of workers, of operators, to daily safety. New concepts and methods that would be relevant for research workers, analyst and managers alike are introduced in an approach centred on unication and elaboration are the key positive variables here, whereas production pressure, organizational pressures, communication failures and distortions are some key negative variables. Integrating all these aspects should lead to an indepth reconstruction of the paradigm

En: Ergonomics. - London [etc.]. - Vol. 40, nº 10, October 1997 ; p. 1148-1158