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Risk cultures and dominant approaches

towards disasters in seven European
countries
a b b
Alessio Cornia , Kerstin Dressel & Patricia Pfeil
a
Department of Political Science, University of Perugia, Perugia,
Italy
b
sine-Institut gGmbH, Munich, Germany
Published online: 09 Oct 2014.

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To cite this article: Alessio Cornia, Kerstin Dressel & Patricia Pfeil (2014): Risk cultures and
dominant approaches towards disasters in seven European countries, Journal of Risk Research, DOI:
10.1080/13669877.2014.961520

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 Journal of Risk Research, 2014
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13669877.2014.961520

Risk cultures and dominant approaches towards disasters in seven

European countries
Alessio Corniaa, Kerstin Dresselb* and Patricia Pfeilb
a
Department of Political Science, University of Perugia, Perugia, Italy; bsine-Institut
gGmbH, Munich, Germany
(Received 22 March 2014; final version received 31 August 2014)

This paper builds upon the risk culture concept started with Mary Douglas’ and
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Aaron Wildavsky’s seminal work on risk and culture. Based upon the empirical
results of a qualitative sociological study on sociocultural factors affecting risk
perception and crisis communication in seven European countries, a theoretical
model, illustrating how differences in disasters framing imply diverse approaches
to risk and disaster management, is suggested. According to this framework, cul-
turally bounded assumptions and conventions strongly influence how communi-
ties make sense of risks and hazards and how these communities consider some
ways of dealing with disasters more appropriate than others. The framework sug-
gested in this article distinguishes between risk cultures of a given society, which
do not necessarily respond to nation states. In order to explain differences in
how cultures deal with risks and disasters, and to define the main features of our
typology, three main interrelated dimensions have been selected: disaster fram-
ing, trust in authorities and blaming. By analyzing differences and similarities in
how people perceive and interpret disasters, as well as to whom the responsibil-
ity for risk prevention and crisis management is attributed, in seven European
countries, three specific ideal types of risk cultures emerged: state-oriented risk
culture, individual-oriented risk culture and fatalistic risk culture. Implications
for crisis management and communication in case of a disaster will be addressed
for each of these risk cultures.
Keywords: risk cultures; risk perception; disaster management; risk communication;
crisis communication; cultural theory

1. Introduction
People look at disasters in different ways. They can be seen as the result of divine
intervention, as an authorities’ failure to set up adequate prevention measures, as the
product of the citizens’ lack of preparedness, as simple natural phenomena or as
unlucky events. Considering the plurality of ways in which a disaster can be framed,
it is evident that they are not only physical events exercising a social, economic and
political impact on a given community but also socially constructed products (Webb
2007), i.e. the result of culturally bounded assumptions and conventions through
which a community makes sense of the hazards it has to deal with. Moreover,
differences in disaster framing imply differences in how people deal with risk and
crisis: if a flood is considered a consequence of authorities’ lack of prevention, for

*Corresponding author. Email: kerstin.dressel@sine-institut.de

© 2014 Taylor & Francis

 2 A. Cornia et al.

example, it is likely that the affected citizens will try to influence public officials to
set up measures to minimize future risks. Conversely, if a calamity is framed as
God’s punishment, different courses of action will be considered as appropriate (e.g.
the population could intensify religious rituals or could resign itself to the idea that
no concrete prevention measures can be effectively undertaken to avoid future disas-
ters).
The aim of this paper is to develop a typology of risk cultures, intended as the
dominant approaches towards risk and disasters within a given community. By ana-
lyzing differences and similarities in how people perceive and interpret disasters,
and to whom they attribute the responsibility for risk prevention and crisis manage-
ment, three specific ideal types of risk cultures will be proposed. It will be shown
that the main features that define these ideal typical models – such as trust in author-
ities, disaster framing and responsibilities ascription for risk and crisis management
– are interrelated each other and present implications in terms of disaster manage-
ment and risk communication. The analysis is based on the empirical results of
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extensive field research conducted in seven European countries that include findings
from interviews conducted with crisis management experts, with individuals who
have experienced a disaster (survivors) and from focus group discussions with peo-
ple living in both at-risk and safer areas.
In the first part of the article, previous studies developing typologies on the rela-
tionship between culture, risk perception and disaster management will be illus-
trated. Afterwards, the concepts and the methods used to construct a risk culture
model as well as the empirical results of our research will be explained. Finally, by
analyzing the dominant trends that emerged from the national research settings, we
will show how each country’s results fit the three ideal types of risk cultures.

2. Previous typologies on the relationship between risk and culture

Since the pioneering work on ‘Risk and Culture’ of Douglas and Wildavsky (1982),
the influence of sociocultural contexts on risk perception and disaster response has
been stressed in several anthropological and sociological studies (Boholom 2003;
Casimir 2008; Krimsky and Golding 1992; Roth 1970; Tansey and O’Riordan 1999;
Tulloch 2008; Van Loon 2003; Zinn 2008). According to this sociocultural perspec-
tive, risk is not a fully objective dimension; instead, risk is also a social construct:
‘what we measure, identify and manage as risks are always constituted via pre-
existing knowledges and discourses’ that are strictly bound to the sociocultural con-
texts in which these understandings are generated (Lupton 1999, 30). Therefore, risk
perception patterns and the ways in which risks and disasters are managed are the
results of social and cultural influences within groups sharing common cultural val-
ues, moral principles and world views. Consequently, risks- and disasters-related
notions vary in time and space: what is considered a risk in a given era and place
may no longer be seen so in a later period of time or in a different location (Beck
2005; Tulloch and Lupton 2003).
One of the most relevant theoretical contributions linking different ideal types of
cultures and the respective dominant approaches to risks and disasters is the grid/
group model developed by Douglas and Wildavsky (1982). This model is finalized
to explain the risk perception approaches followed by different social groups or
organizations within a given society (Lupton 1999). Combining two main dimen-
sions together – the level of group cohesiveness (the extent to which individuals
 Journal of Risk Research 3

identify themselves with a social group) and the degree of grid (the extent to which
individuals interiorise externally imposed prescriptions such as hierarchy and proce-
dural rules) – a typology of four different approaches to risk was developed. First,
the hierarchists, who respect the authorities, tend to conform to group’s norms and
expectations concerning risks and consider crime and turmoil the worst dangers.
Second, the egalitarians, who strongly identify with their group, distrust externally
imposed norms, consider living in harmony with nature as a central value and see
government, industry and science as threats. Third, the individualists, who support
self-regulation of risks, trust individuals rather than organizations and tend to focus
on the threats to neoliberalistic values, such welfare mothers, trade unions, the
unemployed and the underclass (Lash 2005). Finally, the fatalists, who lack strong
group cohesion, trust in luck and fate and tend to see themselves as having little
control over risks.
For our own typology, many concepts and dimensions of Douglas and Wildav-
sky’s model will be used. First, the idea that the way a society deals with risks and
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disasters is deeply influenced by cultural orientations that can vary from one group
(or from a society) to another is also the starting point of our typology. In particular,
we will focus on how a community frames its relationship with the environment in
terms of subjugation to/mastery over nature and, more generally, hazards. We will
also base our model on the kind of relationship established between the members of
a culture and their institutions, focusing on whether individuals trust the authorities
in charge of risk and disaster prevention.
Second, our typology will focus on the collective dimension of risk and disaster
perception: the goal is not to explain or to predict individual variances, but rather to
analyze how a community interprets risks and disasters and to stress the main impli-
cations of this approach in terms of risk awareness, compliance with authorities and
communication. This task necessarily implies simplification and generalization pro-
cesses, focusing on the dominant trends characterizing a group and minimizing the
attention to existing individual differences.
Finally, we will assign a central role to blaming that is who is considered respon-
sible for disaster consequences. Similar to Douglas and Wildavsky, we believe that
blaming strategies that attribute the responsibility for a disaster to the victims, to the
authorities or to fate are shaped by culturally based notions shared by the members
of a community.
Before illustrating our model, a clarification about the expression ‘risk culture’ is
needed. In many studies (e.g. Adam and Van Loon 2005; Heath and O’Hair 2009;
Lash 2005; Taylor-Gooby and Zinn 2006; Zinn 2004), this expression is used with
reference to Beck’s concept of ‘risk society’ (1992). For Giddens (1991), for exam-
ple, the ‘risk culture’ is an intrinsic feature of modern societies, where people
increasingly perceive risks as being caused by humans themselves (e.g. by scientific
and technological developments), rather than by external entities such as fate or gods
(Lupton 1999). In other studies, the expression ‘risk culture’ (or ‘risk subculture’
when referring to specific groups or communities) is used in an unproblematic way,
without defining it, as a general expression to indicate the fact that risk perception is
deeply influenced by cultural factors (see e.g. Roth 1970). Similar to this second
approach, in this article, the expression ‘risk culture’ is not used to indicate a spe-
cific conception of risk characterizing modern societies, but as a general expression
to indicate the specific approach to risks and disasters shared among the majority of
the members of a given group or community. The concept of risk culture will be
 4 A. Cornia et al.

used here to explain how groups and communities share common ways of perceiv-
ing risk, common knowledge about how to deal with disaster, common beliefs about
who should be blamed for the disaster consequences, common feelings of trust or
mistrust towards authorities and similar informative behaviours to be adopted in case
of crisis situations.

3. Key dimensions in our model

In order to explain differences in how cultures deal with risks and disasters and to
define the main features of our typology, three main interrelated dimensions have
been selected: disaster framing, trust in authorities and blaming. Framing will be
investigated by analyzing how individuals interpret the disasters affecting their lives.
Frames are culturally and socially bounded patterns of interpretation that help people
to make sense of the word ‘by selecting a few aspects of a perceived reality and
connecting them together in a narrative that promotes a particular interpretation’
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(Entman 2010, 391; see also Entman 1993; Gamson and Modigliani 1989). Framing
discourses are part of social life: the way people define problems, diagnose causes,
express moral judgements and suggest remedies is influenced by social structures
and predominant cultural values and, at the same time, it contributes to the construc-
tion of social reality, by strengthening or challenging the predominant pattern of
interpretations. As already anticipated, the way risks and disasters are framed will be
analyzed by focusing on the role of human agency, i.e. whether people frame disas-
ters emphasizing human mastery over hazards or, on the contrary, human subjuga-
tion to hazards.
The second concept on which our model is based is trust in institutions, a dimen-
sion that contributed also to the elaboration of Douglas and Wildavsky’s models and
whose relevance in explaining differences in risk perception and disaster manage-
ment has been stressed in many other studies (e.g. Wachinger and Renn 2010; Zinn
2004). Both trust in the authorities in charge of risk prevention and trust in mass
media as a source of information in case of risk or crisis will be analyzed.
The last key dimension is blaming, i.e. the attribution of responsibilities to some-
one or something in order to explain calamities and misfortunes. Our research will
focus on whether individuals tend to blame the public authorities, the disaster vic-
tims or other less defined entities, such as supernatural forces, chance, fate or the
event itself. As stressed by Douglas (2003), blaming is a culturally established and
normative practice functional to maintaining particular forms of social order, to
strengthen social institutions and to confirm moral codes. Both in Western and non-
Western traditional societies, for example, disasters used to be framed as supernatu-
ral punishment for groups or individuals (e.g. enemies, foreigners or sinner women)
that have violated established taboos. These typical blaming strategies were func-
tional to uphold judgements of appropriateness and to sustain specific views on how
a good society should work (Lupton 1999; Tansey and O’Riordan 1999).
However, also in contemporary secularized societies, culturally bounded assump-
tions establish that every death is chargeable to someone’s account and every acci-
dent is caused by someone’s behaviour (Douglas 1992). Here, the concept of risk
itself, rather than the concept of fate, is ‘widely used to explain deviations from the
norm, misfortune and frightening events’ (Lupton 1999, 3). The same ‘natural’
disaster, e.g. a serious flood, that in traditional societies was considered an act of
God, in modern societies is often seen as a consequence of human action (or
 Journal of Risk Research 5

inaction), and in particular of the negligence of individuals or public authorities that

have not adopted the appropriate risk prevention measures, e.g. building residential
areas on floodplains. The concept of risk – intended as a cultural category elaborated
to manage uncertainty in a context characterized by secularization and technological
and scientific advancements (Wynne 1992) – is linked to the idea that the future can
be altered by human agency and that risks involve human responsibility, although
human intervention cannot stop floods or volcanic eruptions, these hazards can be
reasonably predicted and prevented with emergency planning (Van Loon 2003; Zinn
2008). Human intervention is seen to play a major role, and risks, in their contempo-
rary meaning, are substantially based on decisions, principally made by public
authorities or by individuals.
Whether the blaming strategies typical of industrial societies are directed towards
the public authorities, held responsible for inefficiency in risk prevention and crisis
management, or towards the victims, considered responsible for negligent behav-
iours or for low inclination to find personal solutions to prevent the risks affecting
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their own lives, will be investigated in this research. On the one side, citizens tend
more and more to hold political leaders and public authorities responsible for
pre-impact mitigation policy failures and shortcomings in preparedness programmes
(Olson 2000). On the other side, several scholars have stressed how – with the
increasing spread of individualism and neoliberalist ideologies – a shift of responsi-
bilities from the state to citizens is taking place along with a growing emphasis on
private initiative (Halvorsen 1998; Scott 2005; Tulloch 2008).

4. Research methods
The present paper is based on the empirical results of field research conducted in
seven European countries: Germany, Austria, Italy, Hungary, France, Sweden and
the Netherlands. In each country, researchers have conducted interviews with crisis
management experts, with individuals who have been personally affected by disas-
ters, and with focus groups consisting of individuals living in both at-risk and safer
areas.
Concerning expert interviews, 26 in-depth face-to-face interviews have been con-
ducted with senior professionals in charge of disaster management or crisis commu-
nication in the respective countries, including experts from civil protection and
disaster management agencies, but also from other public and private organizations,
e.g. fire brigades, railway companies and ambulance services. Details about the
number of interviews conducted in each country are provided in Table 1.
The main focus of this paper, however, will be on the recipient side of crisis
management and crisis communication, 31 biographical interviews were conducted
with victims of natural disasters – (hail) storms, (flash) floods, mud slides, earth-
quakes, bush fires, heat waves – or industrial accidents – industrial explosions, water
contamination, toxic mud accidents – that occurred in the examined countries (see
Table 1).
Finally, five focus groups were conducted in each of the examined countries
except for the Netherlands. In each country, a focus group was conducted in a rural
area, in a small town, in a medium or large city, in a natural risk area (i.e. a location
characterized by recurring disasters such as floods or earthquakes) and in a
man-made risk area (i.e. a location close to industrial and chemical companies). On
average, 10 participants for each group were recruited (see Table 1).
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Table 1. Data collection across the countries.

A. Cornia et al.

The
Germany Austria Italy Hungary France Sweden Netherlands*** Total
Interviews*
Experts 7 3 2 4 2 3 5 26
Survivors 5 5 5 6 3 3 4 31
Focus groups**
Rural area 9 10 10 10 12 8 0 59
Small town 11 9 10 10 9 8 0 57
Large city 10 10 10 10 9 8 0 57
Natural risk area 11 10 10 10 10 9 0 60
Man-made risk 11 8 10 10 9 10 0 58
area
Total 64 55 57 60 54 49 9 348
*The recruitment of interviewees was done with the help of disaster management organizations located in the seven selected countries. In three countries, survivors were
affected by natural disasters (Germany: storm, hail and flood; Austria: storm, hail and flood; and Italy: mudslide, flood and earthquake). In four countries, both natural
disasters and industrial accidents were included (Hungary: toxic sludge and flood; France: industrial explosion, storm and flood; Sweden: water, air contamination and
storm; and the Netherlands: heat wave, bush fire and industrial explosion).
**Focus group participants were recruited taking into account age, sex, ethnic background and previous experiences with crisis situations.
***Although focus groups were conducted in the Netherlands, they could not be analyzed as they did not correspond to the recruitment plan.
 Journal of Risk Research 7

All interviews and focus groups were conducted by country experts (native
speaking social scientists) that were provided with common interview guidelines or
topic guides, respectively. Expert interviews and focus group discussions were taped,
transcribed and analyzed by the country experts that produced reports for their
respective country. These reports were comparatively analyzed by the authors of this
paper, who also analyzed survivor interviews as well.1

5. Empirical evidence
5.1. Disasters framing
The sharpest difference in how participants in our research frame disasters concern
the human agency dimension: in some cases, they emphasize human mastery over
hazards, whereas in other cases they stress human subjugation to nature or a feeling
of powerlessness in the face of the inefficiencies of their political and civil protec-
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tion systems.
The results of focus groups and interviews conducted in Germany, Austria, the
Netherlands and Sweden clearly illustrate that, in those contexts, people tend to
frame disasters emphasizing human mastery over hazards. According to this per-
spective, both natural and man-made disasters’ consequences can be, if not avoid-
able at all, at least mitigated with appropriate prevention measures and with
effective crisis management. Citizens feel they live in a safe place mainly because
they trust the public authorities’ preparedness to deal with disasters and their effi-
cacy in setting up preventive measures. In Sweden, the link between the popula-
tion’s feelings of safety and trust in the authorities’ capability to manage risk and
disasters emerged most distinctly. The focus groups participants, for example, felt
confident that crises could be overcome if they followed the right instructions, which
they expected to receive from the trustworthy authorities. Similarly, in Austria, there
emerged a widespread assumption that authorities observe appropriate measures to
ensure safety and that, in case of hazards, the communities would be well organized
and there would be contingency plans ready to be implemented:
I think [the authorities] have always many plans and there are directives, laws and reg-
ulations in all areas and, therefore, I have no worries that, for example, something here
would blow up completely because it is technically outdated or never checked, as you
can find in other countries. [Austria, focus group, large city].
Also in Germany, participants felt that their authorities are prepared to deal with
hazards. People living in areas at risk for natural hazards, for example, felt quite sure
that their institutions can properly deal with the events that most frequently affect
their territory, and even participants living close to an operational nuclear power
plant (NPP) declared they felt ‘perfectly’ or ‘quite’ safe because the source of risk is
a ‘German’ NPP, and not a less modern and safe version from abroad.
In contrast to the approach tending to emphasize human mastery over hazards,
Italian, Hungarian and, in part, French biographical interviews and focus groups’
results were characterized by predominantly fatalistic attitudes and by the partici-
pants’ widespread feeling of being powerless in the face of both natural disasters
and industrial accidents. The interviewed crisis management experts also stressed
fatalism is one of the main features of these countries’ risk cultures. Fatalism is the
inclination to believe that events are predetermined and caused by external, often
supernatural, forces (such as fate, God or nature). Both the notions of predestination
 8 A. Cornia et al.

and external force indicate that hazards are perceived as being beyond human con-
trol; misfortunes, illnesses and calamities are interpreted as events that would occur
whether action is taken or not.
The fatalistic approach emerges especially form the Italian research settings,
where participants often expressed feeling unable to act as masters of their own lives
when they imagine themselves dealing with a disaster:
I don’t actually know what I would do in case of disaster. Actually, we are powerless:
if something [bad] has to happen, it will happen. […] These kind of things are bigger
than us: you can try to escape, you can try to take refuge, you can think about what
the best solution is, but […] you don’t have any chance against Nature. [Italy, focus
group, man-made risk area]
Also in the Hungarian research settings a fatalistic attitude emerged along with a
widespread feeling of helplessness. According to participants of a focus group con-
ducted in a man-made risk area, for example, if a major industrial accident occurs,
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there would be no chance of escape for anybody, irrespective of their specific loca-
tion or of the actions they could undertake to cope with the crisis. From this per-
spective, decisions and actions do not affect the citizens’ chances of survival, and
there is no reason to think about best practices to cope with disaster situations,
because – as framed by a focus group participant – ‘there is no protection against
industrial disasters’ [Hungary, man-made-risk area].

5.2. Trust in institutions

Our research results show that the presence of fatalistic attitudes is often associated
with mistrust in authorities: from the research settings where we identified dominant
fatalistic attitudes (Italy, Hungary and, to some degree, France), we also found par-
ticularly low level of trust in authorities. This lack of trust is particularly marked
when participants are asked to assess their confidence in authorities’ role in risk pre-
vention and crisis management. Often, Hungarian participants evaluated the pre-
paredness of their civil protection structures as very inadequate; actors like mayors –
that in Hungary, as well as in the other countries involved in this study, have an
important role in organizing local civil protection activities – are reported to often
be unprepared for crisis.
Trust in authorities is rooted in citizens’ perceptions of the performance of the
institutions in terms of efficacy and impartiality (Backstrom and Edlund 2012). Our
research shows that the widespread lack of confidence in France, Italy and Hungary
depends mainly on the fact that the respective civil protection systems are not per-
ceived as working effectively, e.g. the crisis management organizations are often
considered poorly equipped and the elected institutions are reportedly not provided
with the necessary funding for risk prevention or for reconstructing damaged territo-
ries. In addition, the institutions that are part of these systems are often considered
as clientelistic – or even corrupt – structures mainly interested in pursuing particular-
istic or political interests, rather than structures devoted to protecting citizens that
operate by following universal and neutral criteria.
Concerning assessments on trust in authorities, on their effectiveness and on their
impartiality, the contrast between countries such as Italy, France and Hungary, on
the one side, and Sweden, Germany, Austria and the Netherlands, on the other side,
is striking. Indeed, in the latter countries we found a high trust in authorities’
 Journal of Risk Research 9

preparedness and ability to cope with crisis situations, as well as a widespread

satisfaction about the functioning and effectiveness of the respective civil protection
systems. Assessments like ‘I believe that the municipality has the capability to man-
age a disaster, I live in that faith’ [Sweden, focus group, small city], or ‘I feel great
confidence in the rescue service’ [Sweden, focus groups, man-made risk area],
hardly emerged in the research conducted in the countries characterized by fatalism,
such as Italy or Hungary.
Moreover, trust in authorities is often connected with trust in mass media. Our
results show that, in case of risk or crisis situations, Austrian, German, Swedish and
Dutch participants consider the media to be a neutral and trustworthy source of
information. The mass media, and in particular public broadcasters and the quality
newspapers, are not expected to keep any information secret to prevent the spread of
panic, nor to exaggerate risk (or to dramatize a crisis) to provoke public interest and
attract an audience, nor to be influenced by the news outlets’ political affiliation in
the coverage of crisis management activities undertaken by the authorities. As stated
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by a Swedish focus group participant: ‘I trust the media. There is no reason for them
to lie; I can’t see that. […] Otherwise, one mistrusts the entire democracy’ [Sweden,
rural area].
Conversely, the widespread mistrust in authorities that emerged from the Italian
and Hungarian research setting was often associated with low trust in the mass
media. The participants tended to consider mainstream media (TV, radio and news-
papers) as too connected with the establishment (government, political parties, busi-
ness and other undefined powers). As stated by a focus group participant: ‘I think
that television and radio act as the spokesperson of the state, of the people in
power.’ [Italy, suburbs area]. In particular, Italian participants stressed how journal-
ists often report risk and crisis management situations ‘according to their political
point of view’ [Italy, focus group].

5.3. Blaming strategies

As already anticipated, research results shows significant differences concerning
who is considered responsible for disaster prevention and who is to blame in case of
serious consequences.

5.3.1. Fatalistic blaming strategies and its implications

The lack of trust in disaster management institutions in Italy and Hungary, together
with little confidence in the individual’s capability to deal with risk and disaster situ-
ations, implies a minor focus on risk prevention. This fits with the fatalistic approach
that emerged from these research settings, characterized by the belief that disasters
are unpredictable events whose consequences can hardly be minimized through
prevention activities. Consequently, in case of disaster, often nobody is blamed for
the consequences. Especially from the interviews conducted in Italy, in some cases,
the survivors do not blame anyone because disasters are considered to be caused by
the intervention of a supernatural entity:
You must be angry with God only. He wanted all that, who should we be angry with,
otherwise? [Italy, survivor interview, flood]
 10 A. Cornia et al.

You can’t control the fury of nature. […] Some people thought that … since the devil
came to our village, a sort of divine punishment fell down on us. […] These were
apocalyptic scenarios I don’t agree with, but I remember that people were praying in
the churches because they thought the flood was caused by a demon that was plaguing
us. [Italy, survivor interview, flood]
Considering disasters as beyond human control has important implications in terms of
risk perception. As pointed out by crisis management experts, Italian, French and
Hungarian citizens tend to present little risk awareness: they often ignore risks and,
even when they recognize that a disaster could affect their area, they tend to believe
that they will not be personally concerned by the disasters consequences. As explained
by an Italian civil protection expert, within this risk culture ‘citizens think that they
are n’t personally concerned by risks. Risk is something that concerns only other peo-
ple’. Similarly, according to a French expert, the French population tends to ignore
risks until the effects of the event become evident, and the population is generally
little concerned with risks and disasters even when these occur very close to them.
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As a confirmation that little risk awareness characterizes fatalistic approaches,

cases emerged from both the French and the Italian research settings of citizens that
had not taken the authorities’ alerts seriously: a French focus group participant
reported that she ignored the ringing sirens because, if the alarm would have been
serious, ‘there would have been more noise [around], such as police car sirens, heli-
copters or door-to-door information’ [France, natural risk area]. An Italian whose
house was seriously damaged by a flood reported that he has not taken the weather
alert issued by the municipality seriously because, in those days, ‘the sun was shin-
ing and the weather was really nice’ [Italy, survivor interview, flood].
The tendency to ignore risks also emerged from interviews with individuals that
were already affected by a disaster. Indeed, since they framed the disasters that
affected their lives as exceptional events, survivors tend to think that it is unlikely
that a similar calamity is going to happen again. An individual who was seriously
affected by flood, for example, explained that ‘in principle’ a flood similar to the
one that killed so many people could strike again, but she does not ‘believe that it
will occur again’, because she does not ‘believe that it is possible to be so unlucky
twice’ [Italy, survivor interview, flood].

5.3.2. Responsibility attribution to public authorities and its implications

German, Austrian and Swedish participants tend to consider public authorities as the
main actor, and often the only one, that must deal with risk prevention and crisis
management: public institutions are expected to educate the population by increasing
their risk awareness, to organize drills to improve the community’s preparedness, to
inform the population in case of serious risks, and, more generally, to take care of
the citizens during and after the crisis. As opposed to the risk cultures characterized
by fatalism, here the interviewees and the focus group participants trust the authori-
ties’ capabilities to take care of the citizens’ safety by setting up adequate and effec-
tive prevention measures. From the Swedish focus group, for example, it emerged
that citizens strongly rely on state intervention and do not see themselves as respon-
sible for disaster management and prevention. They also explained that one of the
first thing they would do in case of disaster would be to call the emergency phone
numbers set up by the public authorities to inform them about the situation and to
ask for information on what to do.
 Journal of Risk Research 11

Confirming the widespread belief that the public authorities are the only actor
expected to deal with risks and disasters, participants (especially those living in large
or medium cities) expressed a rather passive role: they were concerned with not
obstructing the work of the professional forces in charge of dealing with the situa-
tion. As explained by a participant, in case of disaster, ‘I would stay away from the
area, so that the rescue service […] could easily reach the area without being
obstructed by many people’ [Sweden, focus group, large city].
As a consequence, if a natural disaster or an industrial accident occurs, the citi-
zens tend to blame the public authorities, rather than the event itself or other actors,
for the damages and losses. Within these risk cultures, political accountability for
disaster consequences is often high. A Swedish interviewee involved in an industrial
accident, for example, considered the local authorities culpable for not having
informed the population about the risk associated with the chemical plant. Examples
of blaming strategies addressed towards public authorities emerged also from
research settings characterized by fatalism. A Hungarian interviewee previously
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affected by a flood, for example, evaluated that most of the flood consequences
could have been avoided if the local civil protection would have built an embank-
ment to secure the area surrounding the river.
A risk culture strongly relying on authorities also presents negative implications
in terms of risk awareness and preparedness: an excessive trust in authorities lessens
citizens’ perceptions of disaster likelihood, strengthens their dependency on state
intervention and prevents the adoption of self-reliance measures. This emerged espe-
cially in the Swedish and Austrian research settings, where participants demon-
strated particularly little confidence in their own capability to deal with disasters and
very poor knowledge of the coping strategies they should adopt to overcome a cri-
sis. For the most part, participants frankly stated that they do not know what to do
in a hypothetical crisis situation. As stressed also in other studies, since people
expect the authorities to prevent hazards, trust could turn out to be counterproduc-
tive and could delay or inhibit citizens from taking their own protective measures
(Harries 2008; Wachinger and Renn 2010). Therefore, similar to the effects of fatal-
istic approaches and mistrust in authorities, an excessive trust in public authorities
can also prevent adaptive behaviours and self-reliance.

5.3.3. Self-reliance concepts and its implications

From the Dutch research settings, and partially from the French as well, an approach
to risks and disasters emerged stressing the importance of citizens’ responsibility in
risk prevention and crisis management. The Dutch authorities strongly encourage
citizens to be self-reliant during crisis situations. The authorities’ communication is
often focused on self-reliance concepts, and the population is expected to be aware
of possible risks around them, as well as to know about behaviours to cope with
diverse crisis situations, the established locations where they have to go for safety,
where to look for information and who to call in order to ask for assistance. Public
authorities’ communication also stresses how citizens should help and inform each
other during a crisis, especially before professional help arrives.
The emphasis placed by the Dutch disaster management experts on the impor-
tance of individual preparedness could appear wishful thinking or a normative state-
ment about how a perfect crisis management scenario should work. However,
evidence that the authorities’ efforts to foster the citizens’ self-reliance have taken
 12 A. Cornia et al.

root in the population’s approach to risks emerged from the survivor interviews. As
commented by an interviewee who experienced a dune fire ‘it was automatically
assumed that people take responsibility for themselves, [and in case of fire] check
who is at home, [assist the neighbours etc.]’ [the Netherlands, survivor interview,
dune fire]. Generally, Dutch interviewees show a greater inclination to count on
themselves in crisis situations and a higher confidence in their own ability to cope
with such situations. An interviewee affected by an explosion of a fireworks factory,
for example, commenting on his own behaviour during the crisis situation,
expressed this kind of feeling:
[I found my girlfriend, I get her to the hospital, I went to check her house] and in the
meantime I made phone calls, I reassured my family that we were fine. I mean, that
was essentially an action plan. That’s what my common sense dictated. […] Even
before the explosion occurred, I had a lot of trust in the fact that … that when I was
confronted with a totally strange situation … Uh, that I am capable of […] making my
way out of the situation. […] That comes from my self-confidence. [the Netherlands,
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survivor interview, industrial explosion]

Dutch interviewees also showed a better knowledge of coping strategies and of
where they can find relevant information in case of crisis (e.g. the authorities’ web-
sites or phone hotlines, etc.), as well as a relatively higher risk awareness, e.g. an
interviewee reported to have spoken with other citizens about how to prevent risks
and how to cope with hazards even before they were affected by a disaster, another
reported to have made a priority list of the things to take with him in case of crisis.
Empirical evidence also confirmed a relatively higher tendency to blame the indi-
viduals, rather than the authorities, for the disaster consequences. For example, a
Dutch interviewee, who participated in a walking event in summer in which several
people were hospitalized because of a serious heat wave, clearly blamed the victims
for not having taken the authorities’ warnings seriously and for not having helped
themselves by adopting specific prevention measures:
There were people who were walking without a head covering, so I though: ‘come on!
Put on a cap! Put a hand towel on!’ But some people were a bit stubborn. […] So,
yeah, ‘take proper care of yourself!’ People received plenty of warnings. […] There
were billboards too, saying: ‘take care of yourselves’. […] [So, mostly the problem
was caused] by people themselves, it’s their personal fault … they did not … uh, yes,
they had actually underestimated things. [the Netherlands, survivor interview, heat
wave]
In French interviewees’ discourses and focus group discussions, the dominant fatal-
istic attitudes were often contrasted with references to self-reliance concepts. Similar
to the Dutch experts, the French civil defence members strongly focused on the
importance of citizens’ self-sufficiency in crisis management. Since the 2004 law on
the modernization of the civil protection system, each French citizen is supposed to
be responsible for his/her own safety. According to this law, the civil defence struc-
tures should be able ‘to count on the behaviours of responsible and informed citi-
zens, who have to be prepared to deal with risks with effective knowledge about the
hazard and about the prevention and self-protection instructions, as well as they
have to be able to be involved in the collective disaster response actions’.2 Signs of
self-reliance emerged also from the interviews with French citizens that, in some
occasions, supported the official standpoint that the population should also take part
of the responsibility for the emergency preparedness of a community, but to a lesser
extent than in the Dutch research setting case.
 Journal of Risk Research 13

6. Discussion: three risk culture ideal types

From the analysis of the empirical results, three ideal typical risk cultures emerge:
an individual-oriented risk culture, a state-oriented risk culture and a fatalistic risk
culture. Each of these types is characterized by a strong interrelation among the
three dimensions taken into consideration for this research (disaster framing, trust in
authorities and responsibility attribution for risk prevention) and presents specific
implications in terms of risk perception, disaster management and communication
(for a synthesis of the each culture’s main features, see Table 2).
It is important to point out further how these models are ideal types in the Webe-
rian sense: they are conceptual constructions based on empirical observation and
they necessarily imply generalization and simplification. Moreover, in some cases
the dominant approach towards risks and disasters that emerged from a national
research setting fits one of the types in a satisfactory way; in other cases, the
emerged risk culture is more heterogeneous and it simultaneously presents features
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of different ideal types.

In the individual-oriented risk culture, individuals strongly rely on themselves in
mastering disasters. The dominant belief is that risks can be generally prevented and
disasters’ consequences can be minimized with the adoption of appropriate mea-
sures. Citizens are expected to be informed about the risks present where they live,
to verify that their houses are constructed in accordance with stringent building
codes, to pay attention to the civil protection authorities’ warnings and to subscribe
to private insurance against disaster damages. The concepts of self-reliance and indi-
vidual responsibility are central within this risk culture: citizens perceive themselves
as actors in risk prevention, disaster mitigation and preparedness and, consequently,
their risk awareness, knowledge of coping strategy and confidence in their own abil-
ity to overcome crisis situations are generally high. The public authorities in charge
of crisis management play an important role in providing technical information
about risks, in rescuing the population during the crisis and in helping the affected
community to recover after the disaster, but citizens feel that they should take part
of the responsibility for their own safety. Implications for crisis management and
communication would be to emphasize the role of public and state authorities in
dealing with the disaster and in providing mitigation for those concerned by it.
Similar to the previous ideal type, within the state-oriented risk culture the idea
that disasters can be generally prevented is predominant. However, self-reliance is
not a central value orientation and the actor considered responsible for dealing with
risks and disasters is the state and its emergency management institutions. The citi-
zens strongly rely on the public sector and the state is considered to be a ‘paternalis-
tic’ one that has to take care of its population’s safety. Trust in public authorities’
effectiveness in preventing risk and in dealing with crisis situations is particularly
high within this culture and, consequently, the feeling of safety is relatively wide-
spread. Also, compliance with authorities’ instructions is particularly high and, when
an alert is issued, the population often takes it seriously. Trust in mainstream mass
media, such as television and newspapers, and official channels of communication,
such as the authorities’ websites, is also particularly high. Consequently, members
of this culture also rely on this media during risk or crisis situations to look for
information about what is happening and how to behave.
Nevertheless, the strong dependency on state intervention generally hampers citi-
zens’ risk awareness and the development of self-reliant solutions: knowledge of
 14 A. Cornia et al.

Table 2. Main features of the three risk cultures.

Individual-oriented
RC State-oriented RC Fatalistic approach
How disasters and Disaster Disaster Disasters cannot be
risks are framed consequences can be consequences can avoided; there is
minimized with be minimized with nothing that can be
preventive measures preventive measures done to deal with
them.
Causal explanations Lack of prevention Lack of prevention Disasters as an
for disasters exceptional event or
as result of a
supernatural power
intervention
Trust in authorities Low, high High Low
Who has the The citizens The public Nobody
responsibility of authorities
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preventing risks
Who is blamed in The negligent or The public The event itself,
case of disaster careless individuals authorities nature, God, fate,
misfortune
How risk and crisis Everyone has to be The state has to The public authorities
management is responsible for his/ take care of its are expected to
framed her-self and his/her citizens’ safety intervene, but the
family (main focus on (main focus on main focus is on the
preventive measures) preventive rescuing phase
measures) (aiding, assisting the
victims) and the
post-event
(rebuilding), rather
than on risk
prevention

coping strategies is generally low as well as the citizens’ confidence in being able to
deal effectively with a crisis situation. The public authorities’ efficacy in disaster
response and, above all, in risk prevention is a critical dimension for the stability of
this culture. Our suggestion for crisis management organizations dealing with state-
oriented risk cultures is to support the participation of citizens in risk and disaster
management activities and to set up communication campaigns focusing on self-reli-
ance concepts, to promote the idea that citizens and authorities share the responsibil-
ity for community preparedness and safety.
Finally, within the fatalist risk culture, citizens feel undefended and powerless
vis-à-vis disasters. Hazards are perceived as unpredictable and unavoidable, since
they are framed as exceptional events or acts of an outside and often supernatural
power. Neither the state nor citizens are considered capable of preventing risks, to
efficaciously deal with crisis situations or to minimize the disasters’ consequences
for the community. Consequently, risk prevention is not a central concept within this
culture, and risk awareness and knowledge of coping strategies are generally low:
members of this culture tend to ignore risks and to think that they will not be per-
sonally concerned by disaster consequences, to the extent that, in some cases, the
alerts about imminent risks are not taken seriously.
Authorities are basically mistrusted and individuals often feel abandoned, unable
and unprepared to act as masters of their own lives. Compliance with authorities’
 Journal of Risk Research 15

instructions is typically high during crisis situations, but could be more problematic
in the post event stage, especially if the authorities’ behaviour is perceived as driven
by special interests. Mass media are often considered partisan actors strictly con-
nected with the political and economic establishment. Consequently, when informa-
tion about a critical situation is needed, members of this culture tend to rely more
on people they personally know and on informal networks of communication, e.g.
neighbours, rather than on the mainstream mass media or on official channels of
communication.
Fatalism is not considered here as a form of ‘primitive’ thinking characterizing
less developed and more traditional communities; instead, a fatalist approach to risks
and disasters emerges when the solutions established within the other two risk cul-
tures do not appear to be effective. Indeed, our research shows that fatalism is often
associated with widespread mistrust in authorities and with little confidence in the
individuals’ possibility to overcome crisis situations.
Our suggestions for crisis management organizations dealing with fatalist risk
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cultures are to carefully reconsider their crisis communication, in particular the ques-
tion of who should be the sender. Our analysis shows that their communication
might not lead to the hoped for compliance if they appear too connected with the
political dimension and that official channels of communication are often mistrusted.
Experts perceived as independent from politics should have a major role in commu-
nication. In order to rebuild a trust relationship with citizens, experts should better
communicate the actions undertaken by the authorities to prevent risks and to assure
the population’s safety. They also should try to support the development of
self-reliance notions.
Figure 1 shows how the main results that emerged from each individual national
research setting fit with the three models. The Swedish, Austrian and German results
satisfactorily fit the state-oriented risk culture model (see Figure 1): these countries
are clearly marked by a strong trust in authorities, by the belief that disaster conse-
quences can be minimized and that the public authorities should take care of risk
prevention activities. Italy and Hungary’s results present features of the state-
oriented model (in particular their reliance in public authorities for the rescuing and
the rebuilding phases), but the dominant trends that emerge from the analysis show
a greater accordance with the fatalist risk culture. Our interpretation is that, in these
contexts, a state-oriented risk culture is strongly challenged by a particularly low
trust in the authorities’ ability to prevent risks and, consequently, a fatalistic
approach emerges as dominant. The Dutch results particularly fit the individual-
oriented risk culture, even if we also identify signs of the state-oriented risk culture.
Dutch participants strongly trust the public authorities and feel that they are able to
deal with risks and disasters in an effective manner. However, compared with other
examined countries, this context is characterized by a stronger emphasis on self-
reliance concepts and by higher citizens’ confidence in their own ability to deal with
risks and crisis situations. Finally, the French case presents an intermediary position
as it features all three ideal types. It is characterized by the belief that the authorities
have to take care of citizens’ safety but, at the same time, by little confidence in the
authorities’ capability to prevent risks. Consequently, a well-established fatalistic
approach and some signs of emerging trends towards self-reliant approaches have
developed.
To sum up, based on empirical evidence on sociocultural factors of risk
perception and crisis communication in seven countries, we have suggested and
 16 A. Cornia et al.
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Figure 1. Relation of national research settings results to the three risk culture ideal types.
developed a theoretical framework on different risk cultures that has its intellectual
origin in the cultural theory as proposed by Mary Douglas and Aaron Wildavsky.
Contrary to their concept, we do not distinguish different risk cultures within a given
society, but we assume that a specific type of risk culture can be attributed to a soci-
ety as a whole, which is not necessarily bound by national borders. In doing so, we
take up and continue the sociological discussion on risk cultures and its implications
for risk and crisis management and communication.

Acknowledgements
This work is based on results from work package 2 (sociocultural factors of risk perception
and crisis communication) of the EU-funded project ‘Opti-Alert: Enhancing the efficiency of
alerting systems through personalized, culturally sensitive multi-channel communication’
[SECURITY-2010-261699].

Notes
1. Quotations from interviews and focus group discussions will be kept anonymous. Only
the source of data (expert interview, survivor interview or focus group discussion) and
information about the location (country, at-risk area, rural area, etc.) will be mentioned.
2. Loi n. 2004-811 du 13 août 2004 de modernisation de la sécurité civile.

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