FROM EMERGENT TO INNOVATIVE RISKS IN FRANCE: SPECIFICATION OR STANDARDIZATION OF THE OCCUPATIONAL RISKS OF NANOMATERIALS?

The process by which occupational risks in industry and manufacturingemerge has been established as a subject of research in sociology. This often-contentious process draws on toxicological βindings that may or may not beaccepted as established, and on epidemiological observations of pathologies.Logically enough, there has been little interest in the toxicological risks ofinnovative industrial technologies, due to a lack of speciβic cases. With thedevelopment of new technologies such as nanomaterials, the question ofrisks has been formally raised but has not been addressed in terms of cleartoxicological results or epidemiological observations. My goal in this articleis to introduce the notion of “innovative risk” to refer to a process of makingrisks a subject of research and discussion before evidence of health problemshas been established. By examining how French labor administrations andoccupational medicine organizations monitor such risks in companies andresearch laboratories, I will demonstrate a tension between, on the one hand,the acknowledged speciβicity of these risks, and, on the other hand, the stan-dardization of actual oversight. This tension calls into question the ability ofresearch on industrial occupational risks to approach and analyze innovativerisks.