Abstract of Meeting Paper

Society for Risk Analysis - Europe 1998 Annual Meeting

Assessment of French Natural Hazards Public Policy: What Results? B. de Vanssay, Doctor in Sociology, Laboratoire de Psychologie de l'Environnement, Université Paris V Member of the Assessment Committee, member of the IDNDR French Committee, 45, rue des Saints Pères, 75270 Paris cedex 06, telephone 0142862098, fax 0142860402

Public policy assessment is a recent process in France; a specific organisation has been created in 1990 as an agency of the French Commissariat au Plan. In 1993, an assessment Committee on natural hazards mitigation public policy was set up on the demand of the Ministry of Environment. About thirty people were appointed by decree; a "pluralistic" approach was adopted implying the participation of people in charge of the implementation of the policy but also of some members chosen out of the administration. (Associations members, sociological researchers, consultants, teachers and so on). The report of the Assessment Committee was issued in February 1997 and published in December of the same year.

Several points have been given special attention - Perceptions of the goals of the public policy : the goals are differently perceived by the various actors, despite a general agreement on "diminishing the level of damages and losses of human lives". The lack of precise definition of what is called "natural risks" leads to classify as natural disasters, requesting damages compensation, events occurring frequently that could be compensated by a normal insurance system.

• The strategies of the actors: due to opposite interests, the various actors are not induced to cooperation. In these domains ( seismic, volcanic, flooding, landslides hazards) it is particularly difficult to set up a global system of action. Multiple agencies are keeping part of the decision making process. The mayors fears to block the economical development of their commune.
• The means of the prevention: it can be seen as a very long or a very short story. The recent laws have made for land use occupation according to risk maps linked with insurance compensation. But the maps are refused by the municipalities, put on trial or ignored ; as a result, the insurance companies reimburse the cost of the damages without checking the adoption of preventive measures; the link between compensation and prevention does not exist ; the system tends to the loss of any feeling of responsibility.
• The insurance system induces pervers effects: the insurance companies can transfer the "bad" risks to the Caisse Central de Réassurance by the way of the reinsurance. The latest is guarantee by the State. The figures shows, during the ten last years, important losses for the Caisse Centrale and important benefits for the insurance companies.

Sixteen recommendations have been done by the Committee - to involve the local population having just suffered a disaster into the decision-making process for reducing the vulnerability - to create a feedback Agency collecting information and analyses on disaster management, cost of the disaster and consequences - to use a part of the funds collected by the insurance companies to implement mitigation measures in order to decrease the future vulnerability- to set up a coordination organism to link the different efforts together.

The recommendations made in the report have to-day to be adopted by the actors. The following questions are not yet answered: Who will take in charge the proposed changes? How many time will it be necessary to do it? What is the effect of such an assessment for initiating changes in public policies?

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