2009 - End of the risk management theory as we know it and beginning of the Black Swan era?

The real value of the services without any obvious value added to a process (e.g. administrative for most of the business and in this particular case risk management for most of the institutions involved in financial business) can be perceived just when delivery fails. This is the case now with the financial industry and one of its services: risk management.

Nothing could be more convincing for the public opinion that RISK MANAGEMENT is a NEED than this financial turmoil we are facing now. Regardless of how much the risk minds would conference about it and how challenging risk managers can be for the ´growth of their organizations the theory and the contemporary practice is by far outdated. As Nassim Taleb challenged the financial community with its Black Swan theory, nothing will be the same, and nothing could be taken for granted anymore. So, where to place the bet, if investment theory lacks of forecast certitudes?

The time has come to move onto a new era. I just got to know that Nassim is working on paper to answer to my question: After Black Swan what? Shall we count along the risk milestones of the Harvard Business Review, this month issue, another one with Black Swan era?

Risk Management Milestones according to HBR September: 

"1952: Mean variance (aka modern portfolio theory) - Harry Markowitz

Late 1950s, early 1960s: State preference theory - Kenneth Arrow, Gérard Debreu

1958: “Indifference theory” - Franco Modigliani, Merton Miller

1960s: Capital asset pricing model (CAPM) - William Sharpe et al.

1973: Options-pricing model - Fischer Black, Myron Scholes, Robert C. Merton

1976: Arbitrage pricing theory - Stephen Ross

1977: Underinvestment problem - Stewart Myers, Clifford Smith, René M. Stulz

1979: Binomial option pricing model - John Cox, Stephen Ross, Mark Rubinstein

1993: A framework for risk management including hedging - Kenneth Froot, David Scharfstein, Jeremy Stein"