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The present thesis concerns methods and knowledge that are useful when analysing the risks and vulnerabilities of complex systems in a societal emergency management context. Operational definitions of vulnerability and emergency response capabilities are suggested and two methods for analysing the vulnerability of critical infrastructure networks, based on the suggested definition, are presented.
An operational definition of vulnerability is proposed. The definition is used to describe and analyse different methods for risk and vulnerability analysis. Several problems related to analysing the vulnerability of a complex sociotechnical system to a specific perturbation are identified and discussed. Suggestions of how risk- and vulnerability analyses can be performed for such systems are pres
This report presents the research concerned with vulnerability analysis of technical infrastructure networks conducted in the research framework programme called FRIVA. The report reviews how network analysis has been used to analyse the vulnerability of systems that are possible to model as networks, such as technical infrastructure systems. In addition, it proposes how these methods can be devel
The fundamental problems related to uncertainty in quantitative risk analyses, used in decision making in safety-related issues (for instance, in land use planning and licensing procedures for hazardous establishments and activities) are presented and discussed, together with the different types of uncertainty that are introduced in the various stages of an analysis. A survey of methods for the pr
In the developed countries the public expect society to be prepared for, and step in, if something out of the ordinary happens. This public pressure appears to have increased the demand for crisis preparedness planning. In crisis management the local authority serves as the first line of defence and will more or less always be involved in responding to crises. It is therefore important to study ho
Information from performed risk and vulnerability analyses, evaluation of responses in relation to actual emergencies etcetera can be very useful in efforts directed at preventing, mitigating and/or preparing for future emergencies. This thesis focuses on the development of methods for such analysis and evaluation. A general process for systematic design of methods is introduced and discussed and
This paper presents a case study of decision-making at the design stage of a socio-technical system where resilience at the global level of the system was constrained by the local perspectives adopted by the different stakeholders. The study is based on interviews with key decision-makers involved in the design stage of six railway tunnel projects in Sweden. The results show that differences in ro
Risk and Vulnerability Assessments (RVA) are performed on many levels of society by many different organisations. In the present paper we discuss how one can investigate if a system for RVA used in a country or a region fulfils its intended purpose. We show how the purpose of the Swedish system can be related to the actual form of the individual RVA documents. This is followed by a content analysi
Risk for drug abuse (DA) is strongly associated with neighborhood social deprivation (SD). However, the causal nature of this relationship is unclear.
Ultraviolet radiation (UVR) exposure is the main risk factor for cutaneous malignant melanoma (CMM), but its specific effect in infancy is unknown. We examined whether season of birth, a proxy for solar UVR exposure in the first few months of life, is associated with CMM in childhood through young adulthood.
