The complex significance of uncertainty in a risk era: logics, manners and strategies in use

Experts, decision-makers and stakeholders dealing with risk must deal with challenges associated with uncertainty. These challenges associated with uncertainty are both complex and significant. In this paper, it is proposed to de-define uncertainty as a reference to situations in which people experience, or construct doubt, on something that matters in view of decision-making and acting, which is made possible, because (scientific) knowledge is perceived or portrayed as limited. The second part of the paper is about dealing with uncertainty. The scholarly focus so far has been on methodology to accommodate uncertainty. Another way is to empirically research logics, manners and strategies actually adopted in dealing with uncertainty. Various uncertainty logics and manners in use are distilled from reviewing quite different contributions, which have, more or less explicitly, addressed the question of how uncertainty is dealt with in various practices.