On ethical grounds, emotions should be considered. Political decisions about hazards are often strongly infiuenced by emotional concerns. Politicians, always with an ear open to people's concerns, frequently seem to prefer anxiety reduction over risk abatement. As emotional concerns are only rarely quantifiable, they can figure in the social management of risks in only unsystematic and subjective ways. This itself is an issue of values.
Values are also closely related to ideals, and many ideals are carried by ethical principles.
Based on such principles, we try to achieve as much good as we can in risk decisions we can infiuence. At first, one might think the ideal would be zero risk. Yet, it quickly becomes clear that no undertaking can ever be risk-free. Increased safety can be achieved only with increased effort and, in the final analysis, cost. Also, under the law of diminishing returns, still more safety inexorably incurs disproportionately higher costs.