6th Global Interactive Forum on Traffic and Safety

6th Global Interactive Forum on Traffic and Safety: The Role of Cultural Diversity in the Management of Road Safety ⌵︎

Dr. Soames Job, Head of the Global Road Safety Facility (GRSF), Global Lead for Road Safety (GLRS), World Bank, and Mr. Kazuyuki Neki, Junior Professional Officer, GRSF, GLRS, World Bank, presented a lecture on the role of cultural diversity in the management of road safety.

Culture, race, politics etc., have very complex interrelationships which are not easily separated, but these all influence the culture of road safety behavior itself, and there are many underlying causes for those. One of the main causes for variations in behavior is the way countries manage road safety, and the cultural influences of road safety management itself become incredibly important for one single culture variation.

There are several broad factors that influence the behavior of the culture that people perceive: situations influence behavior much more than personalities and therefore the situation that road safety management creates on roads is a huge determiner of on-road behavior; it is important to consider where culture variation occurs, which is often within countries as well as between countries; differences in who manages road safety are also influential, such as in the US where there are over 18,000 forces managing road safety, whereas other countries only have one.

Dr. Job raised the topic that the economy of countries is influential on road safety management, but also explained that it is important to resist the view that the economy is the main driver of road safety. There many other major drivers, and culture is one of them. Culture has fundamental impacts on road safety and management. If there is a high societal value on human life, then prevention rather than punishment is fundamentally supported, societal responses are more highly valued, and government and laws become critical, thereby making enforcement feasible.

Dr. Job then closed his lecture with four key messages: cultural differences within countries matter in road safety; cultural differences are not restricted to on-road behaviors; culture deeply influences road safety management; and road safety management influences on-road safety behavior.

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Event materials ⌵︎

GRSF Presentation    Abstract    Video Recordings