The English title of this book is slightly misleading. Despite its emphasis on social risks, the main discussion of the book is neither what kind of risks technoscience would pose to society nor in what ways such risks ought to be understood as social ones. The more precise idea of the book may be conveyed by its original Japanese title: Technoscience Risks and Sociology: New Direction in Sociology of Science and Tech- ology (Tekunosaiensu Risuku to Shakaigaku: kagaku-shakaigaku no aratana tenkai テクノサイエンス・リスクと社会学：科学社会学の新たな展開）.In this book, Miwao Matsumoto attempts to demonstrate how sociology, that of science and technology in particular, ought to approach what he refers to as technoscience risks and introduces an approach called the sector model. As he reveals in the afterword, "this book resulted from [his] impression that we need an alternative to the existing ap. proaches to comprehend the interface between technoscience and society" (365). To achieve this end, he needs to justify his impression, and this is exactly what the first half of the book is devoted to. Thus, the book takes on two main tasks: to present a constructive critique of the current status of sociology of science and technology and to introduce and explicate an alternative approach called the sector model.
