Safety Management Systems and Their Origins: Insights from the Aviation Industry

Safety Management Systems and their Origins: Insights from the Aviation Industry presents different perspectives on SMS to better decode what it means as a safety approach and what it implicitly conveys beyond safety.

The book uses the aviation industry as a basis for analyzing where the SMS stands in terms of safety enhancement. Through a socio-historical analysis of how SMSs emerged and spread across high-risk industries and countries, the book also explains the other stakes underpinning this new approach to safety management.

Features:

• Explores SMS as it is implemented in aviation based on examples from several countries and regions, namely the UK, USA, and Australia.
• Presents a socio-historical analysis of how SMSs emerged in high-risk industries.
• Provides insights to explain the existing limitations of SMS.
• Proposes new avenues to reach beyond the limitations of SMS.
• Discusses the COVID-19 pandemic within the framework of risk analysis.

The book is intended for safety professionals and regulators, as well as graduate students and researchers in safety science and engineering.

Corinne Bieder is a researcher in Safety Management at the Ecole Nationale de l’Aviation Civile (French Civil Aviation University). Initially trained as an engineer, she completed her education with a Master’s Degree in Risk Management, a Specialized Master’s Degree in Ergonomics and a PhD in Sociology and Management Science. She worked in different high-risk industries, especially nuclear and aviation.