The capability concept – On how to define and describe capability in relation to risk, vulnerability and resilience
Författare
Summary, in English
Capabilities-based planning and capability assessment are high on the agendas of several countries and organisations as part of their risk management and emergency preparedness. Despite this, few definitions of capability exist, and they are not easily related to concepts such as risk, vulnerability and resilience. The aim of the present study was thus to broaden the scientific basis of the risk field to also include the concept of capability. The proposed definition is based on a recently developed risk framework, and we define capability as the uncertainty about and the severity of the consequences of an activity given the occurrence of the initiating event and the performed task. We provide examples of how the response capability for a fictive scenario can be described using this definition, and illustrate how our definition can be used to analyse capability assessments prepared according to the Swedish crisis management system. We have analysed the content of 25 capability assessments produced in 2011 by stakeholders on local, regional and national level. It was concluded that none addressed uncertainty to any appreciable extent, and only a third described capability in terms of consequences and task, making it difficult to relate these capability assessments to risk assessments.
Avdelning/ar
- Avdelningen för Riskhantering och Samhällssäkerhet
- Lund University Centre for Risk Assessment and Management (LUCRAM)
- Centre for Societal Resilience
Publiceringsår
2015
Språk
Engelska
Sidor
45-54
Publikation/Tidskrift/Serie
Reliability Engineering & System Safety
Volym
135
Fulltext
- Available as PDF - 455 kB
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Dokumenttyp
Artikel i tidskrift
Förlag
Elsevier
Ämne
- Social Sciences Interdisciplinary
Nyckelord
- Capability assessment
- Capacity assessment
- Risk and vulnerability assessment
- Resilience
- Emergency management
- Definition
Status
Published
Projekt
- PRIVAD - Program for Risk and Vulnerability Analysis Development
ISBN/ISSN/Övrigt
- ISSN: 0951-8320