Emergency management of future global shocks

Large scale disasters provide some indication of the hardship and suffering societies could encounter due to future global shocks. When many countries are simultaneously managing their own crises, however, the capacity to lend resources to neighbours is severely diminished. Effective emergency management for future global shocks entails an even higher order of co-operation than that needed to cope with national level disasters, and should be built on enhanced upstream preparation and downstream co-ordinated interventions. Policy makers need to address capacity gaps in surveillance and monitoring capabilities, readily available countermeasures and automatic back-up systems. In addition to these gaps, and in some cases at their heart, is a lack of appropriately trained human capital to manage external and internal risks that could destabilise systems and create widespread negative spillovers. This chapter considers the global capacity to conduct surveillance of potential global shocks, to activate early warning systems, and the challenge of providing incentives for the production of countermeasures and robust or diversified critical systems.