Professionalization of community engagement in flood risk management: Insights from four European countries

Managing rising residual flood risk: A national survey of Aotearoa‐New Zealand

“…Importantly, as there has been a shift in responsibility for flood risk management from water managers to community members (Puzyreva et al, 2022;Thaler & Hartmann, 2016), quantification and understanding of residual flood risk is, therefore, paramount. Whether directly or indirectly, many actors are involved in the development of flood risk management initiatives (Jha et al, 2012), hence how people perceive and understand residual flood risk has implications for the assets and communities being the subject of such initiatives.…”

More Help Was Offered—But Was It Effective? First Responders and Volunteers in the 2021 Flood Disaster in Germany

“…The official integration of community engagement and volunteers into formal disaster response organizations varies between countries [8,9]. In Europe, there are differences in how volunteers are officially included by insurance, for example, in Norway and Sweden [8].…”

“…Other countries, including Germany, have large organizations of registered and trained volunteers within formal organizations [10]. Hierarchical and more formal structures and professionalization of volunteers are more prevalent in Germany and Italy, for example [9]. However, spontaneous volunteers or emergent situations conduct this formal integration on an ad hoc basis [8].…”

Risk Social Contracts: Exploring Responsibilities Through the Lens of Citizens Affected by Flooding in Germany in 2021

“…The importance of citizen involvement in flood risk management and governance has been emphasised globally throughout the past decades, mirroring a broader localisation agenda within the resilience discourse. This shift away from a solely top-down management is supported by research [1], global policies (i.e., Sendai Framework (2015)), and at European level (EU Floods Directive 2007/60/EC), but also emerged as a lesson learnt from flooding events [2,3]. People or human-centred approaches to flood risk governance aim at complementing the topdown approach with a bottom-up initiative, moving towards decentralisation and sharing responsibilities [1,4].…”

“…From a policy perspective, the empowerment of citizens and communities through increasing engagement and responsibilities was already set as one of the principles of the Sendai Framework to build resilience and reduce disaster risk. In theory, the decentralisation in flood risk governance can foster the active involvement of the general public [7][8][9] which can widen citizens' risk knowledge and have positive impacts on their own resilience (and vice versa) [3]. Active involvement refers to public participation going beyond traditional consultations by, for instance, encouraging engagement in local actions (e.g., implementing flood mitigation measures), contributions in planning as well as in discussions around local problems and solutions [10].…”