Indicators in risk management: Are they a user-friendly interface between natural hazards and societal responses? Challenges and opportunities after UN Sendai conference in 2015
Abstract
Risk management indicators are used to mitigate the potentially dramatic effects of natural hazards. Local authorities
and managers use them in elaborating rescue and urbanism plans, which do not always work, highlighting
society’s vulnerability in the particular context of global environmental and climate changes. Within this
context, the United Nations (Sendai, 2015) advised to construct a series of indicators to better cope with human
losses and economic disasters. Actually, the question is whether or not such indicators do constitute successful
decision-making tools. In this article, we critically reviewed the recent literature (from 2013 to 2017) using the
Web of Science database of Clarivate Analytics to assess how indicators are currently being constructed in risk
management, with a focus on risks of inundations, coastal and seismic risks. This task allowed us to discuss the
spatial and temporal scale at which indicators of risk management can be applicable, to what extent they should
be physically oriented and if they can fit the needs of governance framework. Based on our findings, we suggest
further work on a new series of less descriptive, more dynamic and more user-friendly indicators. Finally, we
encourage the dire need for continuous work to overcome the misinterpretation of used indicators and how to
reduce the communication gap between the scientific community, decision makers, managers and the
population.
Origin : Files produced by the author(s)
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