Flood Action Programs (PAPI): Rating the flood's collective vulnerability through the implementation of an integrated public policy tool

Abstract

Assessment of vulnerability to flooding has been widely investigated by researchers, policy makers and practitioners. The research project initiated between the French insurance dedicated association to natural risks, MRN, and the urban planning lab Lab'urba, proposes to address this question from "action". By making the assumption that territorial vulnerability depends on the collective measures implemented by communities, this research project aims to experiment a national rating method of the territorial preventive effort. To investigate collective prevention, Flood Action Programmes (PAPI) have been identified as the one bottom-up public policy instrument that mobilizes all the prevention actions' levers. The constitution of a PAPI's actions' database, homogenized through a codification process, provides 82 codes reflecting the diversity of actions. To score PAPI, we need beforehand to rate the codes regarding their impact in terms of vulnerability reduction. The codes rating system, produced in collaboration with experts, is based on AHP-ANP models. The resulting national PAPI's scoring will be confronted with different local case studies, e.g. in the context of coastal floods, river floods..., in order to appreciate to what extent the national rating system is adapted to local scale and reflect the territorial efforts to reduce vulnerability to flooding.