New approach to risk management in flood-prone areas in the era of the information society

A prospective outlook on the development of crisis prevention, forecasting and flood management systems in flooding situations is proposed. Such systems were initially focused on technical expertise of forecaster and then progressively widened to encompass the requirements of the technical user and, subsequently, the citizen, client or final user. The authors then take a look at potential services that could be offered, with possible deregulation, within the context of social requirements accompanying the sustainable development of the Information Society. The paper discusses the issues of flood risk management from the European perspective considering the principle of the liberty of the access to a strategic environmental information by citizens and testing how implemented new technologies incite citizens to proactive attitudes and behaviour in the context of risk management in the flood prone areas.