Sarah Whatmore, Catharina Landström and Sue Bradley describe a new way to manage flood risk

We are aiming to establish a new way of engaging the public in the process of undertaking scientific research and translating its findings into policy making. Our focus is on the science and politics of flood risk.

Flooding is a matter of major concern in Britain. It presents urgent land management problems which are the subject of controversy among scientists and the public alike, especially for those directly affected. How can the public become more involved in decisions about flood risk management?

Starting with the people

We undertake field studies in two places prone to flooding: Ryedale in North Yorkshire, where we are working currently, and the area around Uckfield in Sussex, where we will be from July 2008.

The research entails inviting local residents particularly concerned by flooding to join us in forming Competency Groups. These groups might best be thought of as an experiment in democratising science. Made up of scientists in the project team and local people, each group works together over a 12-month period on flooding in the local area as a common matter of concern. The members – researchers and local residents – share their different experiences of flooding and how it is addressed by science; and try out new ways of doing science.

We work with a variety of materials brought by members (from photographs to official reports) which act as both information and as tools for learning from each other in order to create better knowledge about local flood risk and management possibilities. 

Local knowledge

A year into the project, and three-quarters of the way through the first Competency Group, we have, among other things, explored existing flood maps to get to grips with the gaps in their coverage. The map is not a reliable representation of what actually happens in a particular flood: our participants have a variety of experiences that do not conform to what the map predicts.

We are also developing new computer models together. The natural scientists in the group contribute knowledge about the building blocks of this technology and local residents articulate in-depth knowledge about the river, the landscape and the built environment in the catchment we are modelling. For example, when we were trying out the scientists’ model making it possible to explore the effects of dams of varying heights in different places in the catchment, one local resident knew where the soil was loose, making the water disappear into the ground to come up in another spot, near some properties. This local knowledge enabled us to connect the computer model to the actual river in a way that existing scientific measurements do not. 
 
Local knowledge developed through living with the river is brought together and systematically connected to the knowledge of the scientists

Participatory modelling

We are certainly not alone in recognising the importance of local knowledge for researching and managing flood risk, but our approach differs from what is common. Computer modelling is the established way to produce the scientific knowledge that informs flood risk policy and management, but local residents are usually presented with the finished products of modelling as options to choose from. Rarely do they have the opportunity to influence the questions which informed the modelling in the first place.

In contrast, our project invites questions at an early stage from those with an intimate knowledge of the locality. Working together, local knowledge developed through living with the river is brought together and systematically connected to the knowledge of the scientists.

Our construction of a model is different from the standard procedure. It is ‘bottom up’: custom-made to represent a problem defined by the Competency Group, not by scientific theory. It is local: it captures the features important in the locality. It is not an application of a generic programme. Our model is interactive: different forms of information can be put into it, not only data in standardised format. It is also distributed, taking into account the variation in rainfall across the catchment. The model is also grounded in what it is necessary to include in order to explore the processes we are interested in, not what established practice prescribes.

This participatory modelling makes for a more democratic science: one that can contribute to better knowledge about local flood risk and management options, and that helps to connect policy with people directly affected by environmental risks.

The project, based at the Oxford University Centre for the Environment, is part of the Rural Economy and Land Use Research Programme, funded by ESRC, NERC and the BBSRC.
 
Professor Sarah Whatmore and Dr Catharina Landström are at the Oxford Centre for the Environment

Ms Sue Bradley is at the Centre for Rural Economy at the University of Newcastle