Participatory Risk Management Research Articles

Internal Audit Engagement and Risk Management in Public Sector Organizations: Does It Really Exist?

Business entities have undergone a shift in the internal audit function towards a more consultative role. Conversely, in public sector institutions like universities, it is not widely recognized. This study investigates how the new paradigm shift in Internal Audit Engagement in Risk Management impacts the Efficiency of Internal Audit. This study introduces Management Support as a moderating variable in the relationship between the two variables. The study included a sample of 51 internal auditors at PTN BLU. Snowball sampling is employed for sampling, and a questionnaire is used for data collection. The data analysis employed Moderated Regression Analysis (MRA). The results indicate that the first hypothesis is confirmed: Internal Audit's participation in Risk Management impacts the Efficiency of Internal Audit. The second hypothesis is confirmed: Management Support influences the relationship between Internal Audit Engagement in Risk Management and Internal Audit Effectiveness. Management support has a substantial impact on the relationship between the two, accounting for 61.1%. This study confirms that cooperation between internal audits and public entity management can enhance the internal audit's effectiveness.

Internal Audit Engagement and Risk Management in Public Sector Organizations: Does It Really Exist?

Business entities have undergone a shift in the internal audit function towards a more consultative role. Conversely, in public sector institutions like universities, it is not widely recognized. This study investigates how the new paradigm shift in Internal Audit Engagement in Risk Management impacts the Efficiency of Internal Audit. This study introduces Management Support as a moderating variable in the relationship between the two variables. The study included a sample of 51 internal auditors at PTN BLU. Snowball sampling is employed for sampling, and a questionnaire is used for data collection. The data analysis employed Moderated Regression Analysis (MRA). The results indicate that the first hypothesis is confirmed: Internal Audit's participation in Risk Management impacts the Efficiency of Internal Audit. The second hypothesis is confirmed: Management Support influences the relationship between Internal Audit Engagement in Risk Management and Internal Audit Effectiveness. Management support has a substantial impact on the relationship between the two, accounting for 61.1%. This study confirms that cooperation between internal audits and public entity management can enhance the internal audit's effectiveness.

Roles and activities of local stakeholders facing Alpine permafrost warming: A comparative exploratory analysis of three contexts and networks of actors

Mountain permafrost warming resulting from climate change increases gravitational hazards. This interdisciplinary study compares the networks of actors involved in managing such hazards in three regions of the European Alps. Interviews were conducted with 40 people (members of local authorities, mountain professionals, and private citizens) at the foot of Mont Blanc (Chamonix, France), in the Vanoise massif (France), and in the canton of Valais (Switzerland). Data were analysed qualitatively and quantitatively using interaction matrices and network diagrams. Communal authorities played a central role but partnered with many other public and private actors. In Valais, collaboration to protect infrastructure and inhabited areas was centred around communal and cantonal authorities. In Chamonix, the network of actors gave a significant role to mountain professionals. In Vanoise, the network was less dense and less well-defined, although actors had high expectations regarding awareness-raising and prevention. Sources of tension existed in all three networks, particularly between authorities and mountain professionals. To strengthen community resilience, authorities should develop more mechanisms for citizen participation in risk management.

Risk Management Effects of Insurance Purchase and Organization Participation: Which Is More Effective?

Insurance purchase and organization participation in risk management is of great practical significance for stabilizing agricultural production and household income. The aims of this study were to analyze farm households’ choices of insurance purchase and organization participation, and their effects on crop revenue and its higher-order moments using the multinomial switching endogenous regression (MESR) model. The results showed that the adoption of insurance and organization was significantly affected by household head characteristics, farm household characteristics, and cropland attributes. Insurance purchase, organization participation, and their joint adoption contributed to the increase in crop revenue and decrease in crop revenue variance, and the benefits were larger when adopting two risk management tools in combination. When skewness was taken into account in risk management analysis, insurance purchase, organization participation, and their joint adoption resulted in a reduction in the probability of crop failure, of which, participating in organizations was the most effective. Efforts should be put forth to improve the functioning and effectiveness of agricultural insurance and organization to promote the adoption of risk management tools.

Risk Management and Quality Projects Delivery in Nigeria's Construction Industry

The delivery of poor quality construction projects in Nigeria presents a problem which this paper attributes to low levels of Risk and Risk Management awareness, understanding and practice. The little or none existence of a formalised and regulated Risk Management process means the construction industry which normally has a high presence of risk is not adequately managed hence an uncontrolled and unmitigated effect on the value and quality of projects delivered. This paper verifies this submission by investigating Risk Management awareness and practice levels in the industry through a survey targeting experienced personnel who by their project positions are expectedly knowledgeable enough to provide credible feedback. A review focused on select Risk Management literature with an objective of creating the necessary knowledge and understanding needed to practice and apply Risk Management, and also most importantly, evaluate how it relates and influences the delivery of quality construction projects of value. This paper presents results fed by questionnaires specifically designed and administered to unravel and establish Risk Management awareness and practice levels. It reveals low, inconsistent and a non-formalised Risk Management practice in the industry under assessment. It reveals the absence of a uniform regulatory authority. It presents an acceptance of Risk Management as a viable solution to achieving quality projects of value and performance. Based on this paper's findings, a justified case is made for a more formal, consistent and participatory Risk Management process in the Nigerian construction industry. In making this case, this paper posit that if applied, the industry will experience the delivery of much improved projects of value, quality and performance.

ФОРМУВАННЯ СИСТЕМИ УПРАВЛІННЯ РИЗИКАМИ ПІДПРИЄМСТВ

The article substantiates the need for enterprise risk management, which has perhaps the most significant impact on the results of the business entity, considers the classification features of enterprise risks, provides the sequence of the stages of enterprise risk management. Among the stages of risk management are identification of probable risk, risk analysis, choice of method and risk assessment, choice of risk management alternative, modeling of the accepted level of risk, implementation of the constructed model, risk monitoring. The internal and external causes of risks are revealed. The principles of effective functioning of the risk management system at the enterprise are summarized: acceptance and identification on of risks, responsibility of all participants in the risk elimination process; completeness, objectivity and reliability of receiving information; active participation in risk management of managers at all levels of the enterprise; taking into account the causes of occurrence and risk avoidance/minimization factors; application of innovative approaches in order to minimize risks at the enterprise; permanent risk monitoring. The main risk minimization measures in the process of risk management are proposed: diversification of activities and redistribution of capital; improvement of information support for the activities of expenditure enterprises, rational use of loans; stimulating the solvent demand of the population by improving the implementation policy; formation of safe enterprise activity due to insurance and self- insurance; use of funds from reserve funds in case of liquidation of the consequences of the presence of risks; introduction of a risk prevention/minimization system; development and implementation of a risk equalization strategy; wide range of use of risk assessment and modeling methods; increasing the level of business activity of the enterprise; avoiding getting into the risk zone.

Collaborating With Communities: Citizen Science Flood Monitoring in Urban Informal Settlements

Concerns regarding the impacts of climate change on marginalised communities in the Global South have led to calls for affected communities to be more active as agents in the process of planning for climate change. While the value of involving communities in risk management is increasingly accepted, the development of appropriate tools to support community engagement in flood risk management projects remains nascent. Using the Revitalising Informal Settlements and their Environments Program as a case study, the article interrogates the potential of citizen science to include disadvantaged urban communities in project-level flood risk reduction planning processes. This project collected more than 5,000 photos taken by 26 community members living in 13 informal settlements in Fiji and Indonesia between 2018 and 2020. The case study documents the method used as well as the results achieved within this two-year project. It discusses the method developed and implemented, outlines the main results, and provides lessons learned for others embarking on citizen science environmental monitoring projects. The case study indicates that the engagement model and the technology used were key to the success of the flood-monitoring project. The experiences with the practice of monitoring floods in collaboration with communities in Fiji and Indonesia provide insights into how similar projects could advance more participatory risk management practices. The article identifies how this kind of approach can collect valuable flood data while also promoting opportunities for local communities to be heard in the arena of risk reduction and climate change adaptation.

Объективные и субъективные факторы образовательных рисков студенческой молодежи

Analyzed is the concept of risk as an inevitable fact of our time. They researched conceptual approaches to risk of foreign and domestic scientists who substantiate risk as a way of mastering reality, a condition, and stimulus of activity. The article presents an understanding of risk as a new opportunity, which is provided by competent use of information, an ability to make high-quality decisions in society of risk. The article attempts to show some aspects of education not only through its involvement in the risk system, but also as product and risk generator. Attention is focused on the fact that the concept of “educational risk” has not finally formed in science; most scientists research it through factors that affect processes and outcomes of education. Educational risks exist in the sphere of interests and competences of the state, employers, and youth. The authors provide a classification of educational risk and substantiate the relationship of risk groups. The authors propose specific measures for educational risk management, which require systemic multi-level solutions involving participation in risk management of risk groups. It is concluded that students are able to manage educational risk due to a set of knowledge, awareness of the labor market, and understanding of state policies related to education.

The impact of pharmacist oriented mode on risk control in a Chinese centralized intravenous admixture service centre

Centralized intravenous admixture service (CIVAS) centres, which are pharmaceutical departments found in Chinese hospitals, provide high-quality intravenous fluids and pharmaceutical services for patients, and errors in their working procedures can lead to adverse consequences. Pharmacists, the primary CIVAS centre personnel, play a role in risk control; however, to date, the effect of pharmacists’ participation in risk management has not been reported. The main aim of this study was to evaluate the pharmacist’s role in risk control and evaluate its impact. A retrospective observational study was designed to assess the principal working process in the CIVAS centre of a provincial healthcare setting. Errors in the main working process were identified, and intervention measures were formulated. The pharmacist intervention effect was evaluated by assessing the identification rate of improper prescriptions; the incidence rate of drug preparation, compounding, packaging and delivery process errors; and expenditures on wasteful drugs. There was a higher identification rate for improper prescriptions after the intervention (P < 0.05), while the incidence of drug preparation (P < 0.05), admixture (P < 0.05), and packaging and delivery errors (P < 0.01) was significantly lower; the total wasteful medication expenditure was also dramatically reduced. The potential creativity of pharmacists in error control can provide dependable intravenous drugs for patients and reduce the running expenditures for CIVAS.

What We Can Learn from Environmental and Outdoor Education during COVID-19: A Lesson in Participatory Risk Management

COVID-19 has impacted education on all levels, with many institutions turning to online formats to deal with the global public health crisis. This study aims to carefully consider participatory risk management, given concerns about the specific impact of COVID-19 upon environmental and outdoor education. An environmental and outdoor education expedition-style university-based field course at the Laponia World Heritage Site provided the context for considering environmental and outdoor education’s response to COVID-19. Whether or how risk could be effectively managed in the unique setting during the COVID-19 pandemic was explored using action research methodology. A combination of systematic instructor observation, student–instructor communication, and surveys to student participants provided the data to consider the research question. Outcomes underscore the critical role of participatory risk management in environmental and outdoor education settings and highlight the concept of interdependence in environmental and outdoor education risk management. In addition, the research provides support for the action research idea of practitioners as researchers.

Avaliação de serviços farmacêuticos na gestão de risco no uso de medicamentos em hospitais públicos do Distrito Federal, Brasil

Introduction: The frequency of adverse events is high in hospitals and this context supported the elaboration of goals, whose execution involves the hospital pharmacy (HP). Objective: To evaluate HP’s participation in risk management in medication use in 15 public hospitals in the Federal District (Brazil). Method: Cross-sectional study whose data collection was performed from May to November 2016 and involved hospital characterization and hierarchization, HP evaluation according to indicators related to risk management in the use of medicines and calculation of percentages of compliance with the activities provided for in the indicators (outcome variable) with subsequent correlation to variables that could influence their results through linear regression. Results: The average proportion of items presented in risk management indicators was 28.3%. Less than half of the active beds had an individualized dose as drug delivery system. There were 48 reports of pharmacovigilance in the period. The parameters that influenced the outcome variable were: staff training schedule, HP hours with pharmacist, active beds with individualized dose, and percentage of compliance with pharmaceutical services (p < 0.05). Conclusions: The results refer to the need for adequacy and monitoring of services aiming at rational interventions that seek to make the process of drug use safer, by implementing the management models related to HP.

Landslide risk perception survey in Angra dos Reis (Rio de Janeiro, southeastern Brazil): A contribution to support planning of non structural measures

The increasing magnitude and frequency of landslide-related disasters exposes weaknesses in disaster risk reduction (DRR) policy. One of the underlying reasons is that DRR policies tend to focus only on the physical aspects of the problem (i.e. mass movement processes) while neglecting the level of vulnerability of exposed populations to landslide threats, which affects the types and magnitude of adverse consequences. This neglect is a typical symptom of the remoteness that can exist between public administrators and local communities and undermines the implementation of participatory risk management. Certain dimensions of vulnerability depend on how communities relate to the issue of disasters based on their intuitive or rational judgment, i.e. their perception of risk. This paper seeks to shed light on the need for an understanding of risk perception based on the findings from a survey of residents in the city of Angra dos Reis, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, to be taken into account in aiming at a more efficient landslide risk management policy. The survey was carried out through semi-structured face-to-face interviews with residents of three typical hillside communities in this municipality. In general, the study found that residents will often weigh landslide risks against other threats and opportunities existing where they live. It also found that community members find it difficult to see themselves as agents of change in the environment where they live and in mitigating landslide risks, and that better communication is needed between the government agencies involved in risk management and local residents.

INTERNAL CONTROL SYSTEM: SOX-REQUIREMENTS APPROACH TO ASSESSMENT

The European integrational vector of Ukraine's development significantly enhances the requirements for the quality of enterprises` financial reporting that are subjects of public interest, and obliges them to build an effective system of internal control due to the open economy conditions and business chalanges, the availability of a reliable information environment, which would create unquestionable guarantees of investment preservation, becomes significant for the owners of invested capital. By adapting the best practice of doing business, domestic business entities seek to improve the reliability of their internal control system through the usage of tools that have been tested by many years successful business in developed countries. Particularly, under these conditions, the provisions of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, whose previous perception was focused directly on compliance with the law, deserve merit, and participation in risk management was merely an idea. Today, compliance with the law is an important part of the company's risk management system. In the conditions of doing business in an open economy, this objective can only be achieved if the reliable control environments of the company represented by its internal control system are set up. Domestic methods for assessing internal control systems do not take into account the enterprises` needs to undergo SOX control and sjould be improved. The concept of constructing a matrix of internal control system assessment, which includes Control Matrix, Assessment, Remediation and Testing, is developed. The said units of the matrix of the internal control system assessment cover the homogeneous nature of the group of business processes depending on the factors that may affect the enterprise control environment. Each of these blocks can be expanded, depending on the size of the enterprise. The proposed development allows organizing the qualitative and operational work of the internal control system, which will contribute to the effectiveness of making managerial decisions and aimed at preventing the occurrence of fraud.

Managing coastal risks at the Wadden Sea: a societal perspective

PurposeThe trilateral Wadden Sea Region (WSR), extending from Den Helder in the Netherlands, along the German North Sea coast, to Esbjerg in Denmark, constitutes a unique but vulnerable coastal landscape. Vulnerability to environmental and societal risks is expected to increase in coming decades with encompassing new challenges such as demographic changes and conflicting uses of space, both on land and at sea. Meeting these challenges will require a shift toward an understanding of risk management as a social process, marking a significant departure from the dominant technical risk management paradigm. The paper aims to discuss these issues.Design/methodology/approachIn practice, this paradigm shift requires participatory stakeholder engagement, bringing together multiple and diverse perspectives, interests and concerns. This paper aims to support the implementation and expansion of enhanced social processes in coastal risk management by presenting a case study of participatory risk management process. Implemented in collaboration with a trilateral stakeholder partnership, the authors present a mixed-method approach which encouraged a joint, deliberate approach to environmental and societal risks within an overall framework.FindingsThe results enable the authors to deduce implications of participatory risk management processes for the WSR, wherein the partnership can act as a communicator and ambassador for an improved understanding of risk management as a social process.Originality/valueIn this context, the trilateral dimension, discussed here for the first time in relation with coastal risk management processes in the WSR, is emphasized as an efficient level that offers room for enhanced participatory and negotiation processes that are crucial for enhanced risk management processes.

On the role of visualisation in fisheries management

Environmental change has focused the attention of scientists, policy makers and the wider public on the uncertainty inherent in interactions between people and the environment. Governance in fisheries is required to involve stakeholder participation and to be more inclusive in its remit, which is no longer limited to ensuring a maximum sustainable yield from a single stock but considers species and habitat interactions, as well as social and economic issues. The increase in scope, complexity and awareness of uncertainty in fisheries management has brought methodological and institutional changes throughout the world. Progress towards comprehensive, explicit and participatory risk management in fisheries depends on effective communication. Graphic design and data visualisation have been underused in fisheries for communicating science to a wider range of stakeholders. In this paper, some of the general aspects of designing visualisations of modelling results are discussed and illustrated with examples from the EU funded MYFISH project. These infographics were tested in stakeholder workshops, and improved through feedback from that process. It is desirable to convey not just modelling results but a sense of how reliable various models are. A survey was developed to judge reliability of different components of fisheries modelling: the quality of data, the quality of knowledge, model validation efforts, and robustness to key uncertainties. The results of these surveys were visualized for ten different models, and presented alongside the main case study.

Expanding the Reach of Participatory Risk Management: Testing an Online Decision-Aiding Framework for Informing Internally Consistent Choices.

This article presents research aimed at developing and testing an online, multistakeholder decision-aiding framework for informing multiattribute risk management choices associated with energy development and climate change. The framework was designed to provide necessary background information and facilitate internally consistent choices, or choices that are in line with users' prioritized objectives. In order to test different components of the decision-aiding framework, a six-part, 2 × 2 × 2 factorial experiment was conducted, yielding eight treatment scenarios. The three factors included: (1) whether or not users could construct their own alternatives; (2) the level of detail regarding the composition of alternatives users would evaluate; and (3) the way in which a final choice between users' own constructed (or highest-ranked) portfolio and an internally consistent portfolio was presented. Participants' self-reports revealed the framework was easy to use and providing an opportunity to develop one's own risk-management alternatives (Factor 1) led to the highest knowledge gains. Empirical measures showed the internal consistency of users' decisions across all treatments to be lower than expected and confirmed that providing information about alternatives' composition (Factor 2) resulted in the least internally consistent choices. At the same time, those users who did not develop their own alternatives and were not shown detailed information about the composition of alternatives believed their choices to be the most internally consistent. These results raise concerns about how the amount of information provided and the ability to construct alternatives may inversely affect users' real and perceived internal consistency.

Reputational risks and participation in flood risk management and the public debate about the 2013 flood in Germany

Stakeholder participation is seen to be integral for the improvement of flood risk management. In many cases, however, participation in flood risk management practice has also become a space of conflict and debate. In order to better understand these conflicts, this paper focuses on the interplay between the practices of participation which seek to improve the management of first order risks such as floods and second order reputational risks which arise as a consequence of arguments about participation in political and publicised discourses.Our analysis draws on empirical data related to the experience of the 2013 flood, which affected large parts of eastern and south-western Germany. The empirical data was gathered in Saxony and includes interviews conducted with citizens and experts involved in participatory processes in flood risk management as well as analysis of newspaper articles published during and directly after the 2013 flood.The analysis found that practices of participation in flood risk management are highly politicised in Saxony and Germany in general. The basic argument that surfaced in the aftermath of the 2013 flood was that because some groups were very powerful and active in pursuing their individual interests during participatory processes, the planning and construction of technical measures took too long to provide some communities with protection against the flood and hence increased their overall susceptibility. As a consequence of this public blaming of participation for the damages that occurred in 2013, the very structure of participatory processes as well as the right of actors to participate in flood risk management were questioned. The paper concludes that the interplay of institutionalised practices of participation and public and media-related discourses about participation stand in close connection in Saxony. The institutional setting only allows for very limited participation in decision-making processes and, at the same time, provides the possibility for responsible administrations to delegate responsibility and blame to those stakeholders participating in risk management in case “something goes wrong”.

Storm surge risk perception and resilience: A pilot study in the German North Sea coast

Resilience is defined as the capacity of a community to organise itself before, during and after a dangerous/hazardous event in order to minimise the impacts. A conceptual framework is proposed to assess the resilience of a community by understanding and integrating the institutional, legal and social capacities to cope and recover from a natural hazardous event in order to minimize the impacts in the short-term and to adapt to the risk in the long-term. A survey-based method and a specific resilience questionnaire is proposed to explore the perception of stakeholders regarding the risk and emergency management processes as well as psychological and social factors conditioning individual and community preparedness. The method is applied in a pilot area (the Dithmarschen district in the German North Sea Coast) for its validation before applying it to the entire Wadden Sea region, the pilot results being presented in this work. Although some questions may need some type of adaptation to fit adequately to other study sites, the conceptual and methodological framework could be applied worldwide. The study area and its population are characterized by their continuous interaction with the ocean, with the continuous transformation and reclamation of land for agricultural and other purposes, the constant reshaping of the coastline and frequent coastal inundation by storm surge flooding. The assessment allows identifying the main characteristics of the study area in terms of stakeholders' risk perception, intention to prepare, individual and societal behavioural patterns, as well as their opinion regarding authorities' decision-making on emergency and risk management. It also addresses potential improvement in emergency and risk management in terms of multi-sector partnerships and additional adaptation measures for the area. The deficiencies and incoherencies between society's and administration's answers detected in the analysis point towards the challenges to deal with, in order to foster an adequate community preparedness and adaptation to storm surge risk. Some of the results that the proposed method permitted to obtain in the study area show (i) the need for a better information strategy to enhance society's awareness and preparedness; (ii) the respondents' current proactive behaviour and preference on participatory risk management options, despite fully participatory schemes are not yet set by the authorities; (iii) the need for awareness campaigns regarding the relevance and benefits of the integrated approach in potential partnerships, and (iv) the need for tailored and site-specific adaptation instruments and measures due to the current society's disagreement with some of the options currently provided. The results are useful to improve risk reduction initiatives by means of including society's opinions from the beginning of the management process.

Food and Nutrition Hazards Related to Public Health, Food Technology and Ecology: Perceptions of Experts and Non-experts in the United Kingdom

Aim: This study investigated perceptions of risk to self, risk to society, risk denial, control, responsibility, trust and knowledge of food and nutrition-related hazards among expert and nonexpert groups with an aim of better understanding barriers to effective communication between experts and the public. Design: Participants completed a questionnaire housed on an online platform. Methodology: Experts were recruited from nutritionists in the food industry in the UK. Non-experts were recruited from a voluntary public panel with access to the online platform. Questions documented demographic variables and scores for the risk that food and nutrition-related hazards pose to self and society. Participants scored perceptions of expert and personal control of hazards, personal responsibility for averting the hazards, trust in experts for managing the hazards and personal knowledge of the hazards. The hazards were categorised for analysis into public nutrition, food technology and food ecology to reflect degrees of citizen participation in risk management. Results: Experts scored perception of risk to self and risk to society from food technology hazards significantly lower than non-experts. Both groups had greatest risk denial, scores of personal control, personal responsibility and personal knowledge, and lowest scores for expert control, for public nutrition hazards. Trust in experts was higher among experts than it was among nonexperts. Gender, personal responsibility and knowledge, but not trust in experts, were significant predictors of risk perception. Conclusions: There were similarities in perception of risk of public nutrition and food ecology Original Research Article Bahra and Mullen; EJNFS, 5(3): 166-178, 2015; Article no.EJNFS.2015.016 167 hazards between experts and non-experts, but differences in the perception of risk and trust in experts relating to food technology. Both groups perceived higher personal control of and personal responsibility for, and lower expert control for, public nutrition hazards.

Evaluation of a participatory risk management work stress intervention.

Evaluation of a participatory risk management work stress intervention.