Exploring collaborative crisis management: A model of essential capabilities

Abstract

Crises at the societal level demand responses outside the normal and routine-based. Insufficient ability to handle a crisis risks to negatively affect several societal values, for example human life and health, the functionality of society or democracy. Due to the extent and complexity of these types of crises, they demand adapted collaborative responses based on several actors, which may not commonly act together. Although there is plenty of experience in crisis management, it is still not clear what capabilities enable different actors to jointly act in a coordinated manner when dealing with crises. The objective of this study was to develop a model of capabilities that constitute collaborative crisis management. The study was carried out in three activities: defining capabilities, validating the capabilities, and detailing the descriptions of the capabilities. The result was 14 capabilities categorized as core, supportive, and enabling. This capability model reflects vital capabilities of actual collaborative crisis management. It is applicable to the support of development and maintenance of the collaborative crisis management capability.