TABLE OF CONTENTS "Although my commitment to the goal of immortality is unswerving, I am not positive that a zero risk society is yet in the scientific cards"
Daniel I. Koshland, Jr.
Nature, 17 April 1987
A quick look through the daily newspapers shows that all human activity is surrounded by hazards and associated risks. Road accidents, disease, fires, financial collapse are all part of human existence.
In personal affairs, we tend to manage risks implicitly. In a visit to the local grocery store on foot, we tend to avoid high traffic routes, cross roads at traffic lights or pedestrian crossings to minimize risk of injury or death. When it comes to managing risks to stakeholders in an enterprise, more formal and explicit measures are required.
Risk management has been practised for millennia in all areas of human activity. The earliest concept of loss prevention was self-defence to save one's possessions and property against attacks by enemy tribes. Since the industrial revolution, and in the aftermath of industrial disasters costing multiple lives, there has been a gradual, though not necessarily systematic improvement in work place safety. With the advent of major public companies in the 20th century and the depression of the 1930s, the need for financial risk management and protection of shareholders' interests has evolved as a separate field of study.
In the meantime, the insurance industry has been engaged in risk management in its own way. The focus has been largely on minimising losses in the aftermath of an accident...
