Understanding the current practices of risk-informed governance and decision making: A case of Swedish multi-hazard societal environments

Disasters are increasingly seen as complex societal problems that are solved by building strategic capacity for societal resilience.

Existing research finds pragmatic risk-informed governance more suitable for the task than deterministic risk management approaches as they fall short in complex socio-technical contexts.

While this view is aligned with the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction, it poses new challenges to decision- and policymakers.

The present work aims to identify what kind of information and knowledge about risks is currently used for public decisions connected to multi-hazard societal environments in Sweden, and to what extent this practice contributes to the goal of societal resilience. The case of this study is a combination of forest fires, drought, and a local breadbasket failure.

Desk review and interviews are undertaken for data collection.

For the desk review, public documents and reports are obtained via the Disaster Prevention Web and homepages of the Swedish Local Government Administration. For the interviews, contact is established with selected Municipalities. Data analysis is performed through content and thematic analysis.

The results highlight gaps in the strategic alignment of public decision-making mechanisms with the global targets of building capacity for societal resilience. A potential for strengthening risk-informed governance is outlined for Sweden. The study contributes to the global discourse of disaster risk reduction.