Risk, decision-making and trust relates to implementation of policies and policy more generally. The research about decision-making is mainly concentrated on water, both in terms of flooding and high flows in the Swedish rivers and to the environmental objectives connected to water and the implementation of these objectives in the Swedish municipalities. The studies on flooding and high flows focus on the River groups, a network consisting of both public and private actors.

The studies of the river groups will be expanded to include all 30 river groups in Sweden and to the Nordic countries in order to investigate the prevention of floods and high flows and how this differs between the Nordic countries. Trust and risk are related concepts and the aim of the studies in this area is to further investigate the importance of trust in relation to risk. Our research shows that trust is an important factor both in relation to risk policy, professions and risk management in general and for risk perception and risk commutation in particular. Localized trust or community trust is important for local collective action and cooperation which may be essential in dealing with risk and crisis.