Vera Kauppinen

Bio: Vera Kauppinen is an academic researcher. The author has contributed to research in topics: Community resilience & Sociogram. The author has an hindex of 1, co-authored 1 publications receiving 7 citations.

Configurations of community in flood risk management

Abstract: Despite a notable increase in the literature on community resilience, the notion of ‘community’ remains underproblematised. This is evident within flood risk management (FRM) literature, in which t...

Conceptualizing community in disaster risk management

Abstract: Community resilience is often assessed in disaster risk management (DRM) research and it has been argued that it should be strengthened for more robust DRM. However, the term community is seldom precisely defined and it can be understood in many ways. We argue that it is crucial to explore the concept of community within the context of DRM in more detail. We identify three dominating views of conceptualizing community (place-based community, interaction-based community, community of practice and interest), and discuss the relevance of these conceptualizations. We base this discussion on quantitative and qualitative empirical and policy document data regarding flood and storm risk management in Finland, wildfire risk management in Norway and volcanic risk management Iceland. According to our results, all three conceptualizations of community are visible but in differing situations. Our results emphasize the strong role of public sector in DRM in the studied countries. In disaster preparedness and response, a professionalized community of practice and interest appear to be the most prominent within all three countries. The interaction-based community of informal social networks is of less relevance, although its role is more visible in disaster response and recovery. The place-based (local) community is visible in some of the policy documents, but otherwise its role is rather limited. Finally, we argue that the measured resilience of a community depends on how the community is conceptualized and operationalized, and that the measures to strengthen resilience of a particular community should be different depending on what the focal community is.

A review of the community flood risk management literature in the USA: lessons for improving community resilience to floods

Abstract: This study systematically reviews the diverse body of research on community flood risk management in the USA to identify knowledge gaps and develop innovative and practical lessons to aid flood management decision-makers in their efforts to reduce flood losses. The authors discovered and reviewed 60 studies that met the selection criteria (e.g., study is written in English, is empirical, focuses on flood risk management at the community level in the USA, etc.). Upon reviewing the major findings from each study, the authors identified seven practical lessons that, if implemented, could not only help flood management decision-makers better understand communities’ flood risks, but could also reduce the impacts of flood disasters and improve communities’ resilience to future flood disasters. These seven lessons include: (1) recognizing that acquiring open space and conserving wetlands are some of the most effective approaches to reducing flood losses; (2) recognizing that, depending on a community’s flood risks, different development patterns are more effective at reducing flood losses; (3) considering the costs and benefits of participating in FEMA’s Community Rating System program; (4) engaging community members in the flood planning and recovery processes; (5) considering socially vulnerable populations in flood risk management programs; (6) relying on a variety of floodplain management tools to delineate flood risk; and (7) ensuring that flood mitigation plans are fully implemented and continually revised.

Critical infrastructure vulnerability: a research note on adaptation to climate change in the Nordic countries

Abstract: This research note reviews recent literature on the vulnerability of critical infrastructures caused by climate change with a focus on the Nordic countries We integrate literature from three resea

Cross-scale interactions in flood risk management: A case study from Rovaniemi, Finland

Abstract: Cross-scale interactions affect resilience in a wide array of social systems such as flood risk management, but it has been argued that studies of such interactions remain limited. Based on qualitative interviews, quantitative surveys, and policy document analysis, I employed the panarchy framework in an analysis of temporal changes and cross-scale interactions in flood risk management at the local and regional scale in Rovaniemi, in Finnish Lapland. The results revealed that administrative co-operation in flood preparedness has functioned well in Rovaniemi in recent decades and few changes have been made to it. Nevertheless, flood defense measures have been the subject of a persistent and dynamic conflict, which has been locked in a polarized phase. Among local residents' approaches to flood risk management, there have been few changes in preparedness, although administrative actors have emphasized communication and self-preparedness in recent years. I discuss how the cross-scale mismatches have contributed to hinder the flood risk management, sharpen the conflict over flood defense measures, and keep the local residents’ level of preparedness low.