I read with interest the article Potential for More  from SHP and it’s so much about what Safety does, is look at itself. It reminds me of Narcissus, the Greek myth of the man who falls in love with his own image:

It seems whenever Safety wants to know something, it looks at itself. So much published by Safety (like the free download of the 50-year history of safety in the UK) is written by Safety for Safety, about Safety.

It seems every time a book comes out published by Safety, it is written by Safety. It’s always the same old worldview, the same old stuff, often rebranded in spin about ‘new view’ or ‘differently’ but it’s still about: systems, performance, counting, performance, reporting, performance, controls, performance, measurement and performance. It is very rare to read a book with the word ‘safety’ in the title that is NOT like this (https://safetyrisk.net/mindfulness-is-not-brain-fullness-and-other-psychosocial-myths/). Just listen to any safety podcasts, even those that claim new rhetoric such as ‘punk rock safety’ and its all the same stuff. Just look at the subject list for this podcast and its all the same old stuff. I saw with interest recent marketing for a conference in Paris and it was all about escaping the ‘safety blues’. Just more evidence that Safety has no vision and no clue of what to do about itself. Ah yes, but if you fork out a few thousand dollars we will give you the new safety view that is more of the same. Slick marketing and nothing new.

In this article in SHP we read about the development of Safety as an industry (not a profession) of regulation, counting and policing and nothing has changed over the 50 years. Safety remains a behaviourist-engineering focused mono-disciplinary industry that continues to look at itself hoping to find vision. And of course, in such a history Safety never mentions its addiction to zero or its identity as Zero (https://safetyrisk.net/safetyzero-culture/) nor has anything to do with Ethics.

When Safety looks at itself, it always ‘frames’ (https://safetyrisk.net/frames-of-mind-and-how-the-mind-frames-risk/) that look though the same old worldview: Heinrich, Reason, Peterson, Dekker etc. Pick up any safety text and you’ll find the pyramids, the curves and the swiss-cheese, all nonsense myths believed and promoted. You can’t challenge the myths of safety, that makes you anti-safety.

Even when Safety discovers that trends such as S2 are silly, it then tries to re-invent itself in the same version of itself, with new rhetoric such as Safety Differently, Resilience Engineering, New View and HOP. Each morphing in rhetoric in new spin for the same thing: systems, performance, counting, performance, reporting, performance, controls, performance, measurement and performance. In this alternate reality we call normal a ‘pre-accident’ or ‘post-accident’. In this new rhetoric we call innovation ‘human organisational performance’ but it’s the same old Safety. I wonder how long it will take for the next morphing of Safety into itself?

Look at any safety qualification (including at the so called ‘safety science lab’) and its reading list to see what is there, and its Safety, reading Safety to get a new vision for Safety. And, when it gets lost, it invents new rhetoric like ‘brain safety’, ‘psychosocial hazards’ or ‘psychological safety’ or ‘neuroscience safety’ (https://safetyrisk.net/safety-and-non-neuroscience/) that is just code for more behaviourism. You don’t have to be too clever to read the safety code (https://safetyrisk.net/deciphering-safety-code/) to see the same old stuff: systems, performance, counting, performance, reporting, performance, controls, performance, measurement and performance.

There is nothing Transdisciplinary about Safety. It has no ethic of innovation (https://safetyrisk.net/an-ethic-for-innovation/). An ethic of innovation, discovery and creativity is too dangerous for Safety that must be in control and know all controls. Yet you will read rhetoric everywhere in safety about learning and innovation. There is none. The only way to be innovative in Safety is to step outside the worldview of Safety to discover all the other disciplines that challenge Safety. Safety is the ultimate Archetype (https://safetyrisk.net/understanding-safety-as-an-archetype/) that cannot tolerate non-compliance. Innovation requires moving outside of an old paradigm, Safety can’t do that. Safety=Zero. Shuffling the deck chairs on the Titanic doesn’t change the outcome.

The only way to really be innovative and creative is to look outside of one’s self. The only way to discover vision and inspiration is to explore disciplines beyond oneself. The best way to learn in safety is to NOT read Safety. There is no vision in Zero, just as there is no vision in Safety. Only in a Transdisciplinary approach can one escape the confines of the Safety worldview. If you are interested in a Transdisciplinary worldview that is positive, constructive, innovative and creative you can study here: https://cllr.com.au/product/transdisciplinarity-and-risk-unit-16/