Integrated Crisis Management: What did We Learn from Flood Management in Thailand?

Abstract

General crisis management concept focused only on reactive crisis management process and forgot to learn from the crisis experience; as a result, crises recurred. Flooding is regarded as one of crisis types. This study focused on flood management of municipalities in Thailand in the year 2011 because the floods in the year 2011 caused large-scale damage to many areas beyond expectation. Although, municipalities along the Chao Phraya River attempted to prevent flooding in their cities by applying their knowledge from previous crisis experience, Pakkret Municipality could save most of their areas from flooding whereas Nakhon Sawan Municipality failed to prevent flooding in their city. This study is descriptive research and conducted interviews of key informants of both Pakkret Municipality and Nakhon Sawan Municipality. They were interviewed to explain why flood prevention models of both municipalities came out with different results even though both of them experienced the same flood in the past. Research results shed light on the importance of learning from crisis experience and cooperation among crisis stakeholders.