This paper reviews the use of “agents” of deterioration or change in heritage risk assessment and examines the implications of using an agent-based approach to characterising risk. The paper highlights some problems connected to risk assessment that stem from using “agents,” including the need to represent synergistic action between agents, a hierarchy amongst agents where some have direct and indirect impact upon exposure to other agents and the lack of effective representation of inherent deterioration. The paper briefly discusses various approaches that might mitigate the problems identified. These include changing the way in which risk is viewed to a more conceptually integrated approach, adding more techniques to risk assessment and risk management, such as dependency modelling, and using more advanced statistical approaches, such as principal component analysis.
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