Supporting the Development of a Social Science Strategy
for Flood and Coastal Erosion Risk Management (FCERM) R&D research
Department for
Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) &
Environment Agency
Link to project
team website
Background to the project
Recent developments in
Defra and Environment Agency policies on flood risk management, from
Directing the Flow, through the Environment Agency's Flood Risk
Management Strategy, to Making Space for Water, place increasing
emphasis on social dimensions. These reflect broader developments in
Defra and Agency policy (see the latest
Defra FCERM R&D Newsletter).
For example, health and the environment, environmental
inequalities, regeneration, liveability and environmental citizenship
are all key elements of the quality of life theme within the Environment
Agency's new corporate strategy, Creating a Better Place.
Project
objectives
Objective 1: Develop
a vision and facilitate development of a draft strategy for social
science research within the FCERM R&D programme for the next five years
in a way that builds on the understanding of social science research
practices, and the institutional capacity to apply these, from the
outset.
Objective 2: Develop
practical understanding and application of social science research
practices within the context of the four themes of the new FCERM R&D
programme.
Objective 3: Build
institutional capacity for social science research practices by
developing and working with a network of ‘social science champions’.
Objective 4: Make
recommendations to embody the emerging understandings of social science
research practice, and proposals within relevant strategy, policy and
guidance documents.
Objective 5:
Evaluate the whole project and establish a process to ensure
post-project sustainability
Project
methodology
1. Review
of the academic and policy literature.
The research team will gather together existing knowledge on the social
and institutional aspects of flooding, including examples from countries
with linking characteristics to the UK.
2. Interviews
with key stakeholders.
To support this review, the research team will carry out a small number
of interviews with key stakeholders in order to ensure that relevant
evidence has been considered in the different parts of the project but
also that the opinions and views of those stakeholders are collected.
3. Workshop
with a range of Environment Agency staff and community
members to discuss emerging proposals and to evaluate the practical
implementation of the different options.
Project Outputs
Milestone 1:
Start up meeting minutes and project profile
Milestone 2: Draft
vision and principles to underpin the social science strategy
Milestone 3: Strategy
statement for each theme to go to TAGs
Milestone
4: Resources for training and plan for sustainability
Milestone 5: Evaluation Framework
Milestone 6: Draft final report
Timetable
The project started in
January 2007 and will run until 31 March 2008.
Project Team
The project
team is made up of:
Dr. Clare Twigger-Ross,
Bill Sheate, Amalia Fernandez-Bilbao and Paul Orr of Collingwood Environmental
Planning
Prof. Edmund Penning-Rowsell,
Sue Tapsell, Sylvia Tunstall, Dr. Simon McCarthy of Flood Hazard
Research Centre, Middlesex University
Diane Warburton,
Shared Practice
Prof Simin Davoudi,
University of Newcastle
Dr. Jane Fielding,
University of Surrey
Link to project team site
For more
information contact:
