Governing Alongside the Specter of Risk Society: Legislating US Terrorism Risk Insurance, 2001-2007

ABSTRACT

The continued extension of the Terrorism Risk Insurance Act (TRIA) providing federal financial support to the insurance industry in the event of further terrorist attacks in the US does not reflect the advent of a risk society of uninsurable danger. While the specter of risk society has tracked and influenced the legislative process, it has done so discontinuously and often contentiously. Instead, the legislative trajectory reveals the current insurance arrangements as being shaped by a heterogeneous collection of analyses, calculations and concerns as legislators have sought to govern the insurability of terrorist acts. The paper addresses how, why and with what implications governmental endeavors can become implicated with risk society concepts.