{"title":"Thomas D Beamish","description":null,"products":[{"product_id":"after-tragedy-strikes-book-thomas-d-beamish-9780520401075","title":"After Tragedy Strikes","description":"A very smart book about risk and disaster and, more importantly, the larger contexts in which those things are defined as such. I found this book more interesting than nearly all the sociology I've read in the past five or ten years. This is timely and will be one of those books that floats into and out of relevance. COVID isn't gone; it'll come back. And there will be other attacks like it. Climate change is, so smart people say, responsible for everything from your state burning up to my hangnail. Whether something is actually done about the state burning up will depend precisely on the kinds of points Beamish makes.--Lee Clarke, Professor Emeritus of Sociology, Rutgers University","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"GB \/ NEW \/ GARDNERS","offer_id":49748453490961,"sku":"NGR9780520401075","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ NEW \/ INGRAM","offer_id":51002966868241,"sku":"NIN9780520401075","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/0520401077.jpg?v=1750815446"},{"product_id":"silent-spill-book-thomas-d-beamish-9780262523202","title":"Silent Spill","description":"\u003cp\u003eIn the Guadalupe Dunes, 170 miles north of Los Angeles and 250 miles south of San Francisco, an oil spill persisted unattended for 38 years. Over the period 1990-1996, the national press devoted 504 stories to the Exxon Valdez accident and a mere nine to the Guadalupe spill--even though the latter is most likely the nation's largest recorded oil spill. Although it was known to oil workers in the field where it originated, to visiting regulators, and to locals who frequented the beach, the Guadalupe spill became troubling only when those involved could no longer view the sight and smell of petroleum as normal. This book recounts how this change in perception finally took place after nearly four decades and what form the response took.Taking a sociological perspective, Thomas Beamish examines the organizational culture of the Unocal Corporation (whose oil fields produced the leakage), the interorganizational response of regulatory agencies, and local interpretations of the event. He applies notions of social organization, social stability, and social inertia to the kind of environmental degradation represented by the Guadalupe spill. More important, he uses the Guadalupe Dunes case as the basis for a broader study of environmental blind spots. He argues that many of our most pressing pollution problems go unacknowledged because they do not cause large-scale social disruption or dramatic visible destruction of the sort that triggers responses. Finally, he develops a model of social accommodation that helps explain why human systems seem inclined to do nothing as trouble mounts.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"US \/ GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":50347472191761,"sku":"CIN0262523205G","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ VERY_GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":51330316566801,"sku":"CIN0262523205VG","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"GB \/ NEW \/ INGRAM","offer_id":52684971966737,"sku":"NLS9780262523202","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/0262523205.jpg?v=1751389099"},{"product_id":"community-at-risk-book-thomas-d-beamish-9780804784429","title":"Community at Risk","description":"In 2001, following the events of September 11 and the Anthrax attacks, the United States government began an aggressive campaign to secure the nation against biological catastrophe. Its agenda included building National Biocontainment Laboratories (NBLs), secure facilities intended for research on biodefense applications, at participating universities around the country. In Community at Risk, Thomas D. Beamish examines the civic response to local universities' plans to develop NBLs in three communities: Roxbury, MA; Davis, CA; and Galveston, TX. At a time when the country's anxiety over its security had peaked, reactions to the biolabs ranged from vocal public opposition to acceptance and embrace. He argues that these divergent responses can be accounted for by the civic conventions, relations, and virtues specific to each locale. Together, these elements clustered, providing a foundation for public dialogue. In contrast to conventional micro- and macro-level accounts of how risk is perceived and managed, Beamish's analysis of each case reveals the pivotal role played by meso-level contexts and political dynamics. Community at Risk provides a new framework for understanding risk disputes and their prevalence in American civic life.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"- \/ - \/ -","offer_id":51007519162641,"sku":"","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"US \/ NEW \/ INGRAM","offer_id":51007521751313,"sku":"NIN9780804784429","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/0804784426.jpg?v=1757416400"}],"url":"https:\/\/www.worldofbooks.com\/collections\/author-books-by-thomas-d-beamish.oembed","provider":"World of Books ","version":"1.0","type":"link"}