Citizens Observatories on Geohazards: Lessons from Five Pilots

This open access book shows how citizens' involvement in geohazard risks prevention can strengthen regional and national risk management systems, to demonstrate a new form of engagement between civil society and local authorities. The lessons learned in in this book, where the local communities were engaged to actively participate in risk preparedness and monitoring and incorporate local capacities into risk management systems, are reported. A cooperation and resource platform on geohazards risk assessment, preparedness, mitigation, and prevention was used as interface between the citizens and the risk management system. A more efficient uptake of Copernicus data, products, and services on regional level is discussed, to improve geohazard risk prevention and resilience to natural disasters. Recommendations for the creation of future observatories in response to the widest range of hazards (both natural and human-induced) in Europe and in the world are provided.