The Use of Expert Knowledge in the Danish National Risk Profile

Expert opinion is an engrained part of risk analysis, but there needs to be more debate on the efficacy of Strength of Knowledge (SoK) in aggregated strategic risk reports like the Danish National Risk Profile (NRP). This paper discusses the utility of expert opinions by government agencies and the uncertainties associated with this practice. The NRP is a publication issued by the Danish Emergency Management Agency (DEMA) that describes threats to Danish society in the short to medium term. The ambition is for government agencies, companies, and other
organisations to use the profile as a strategic document that identifies which threats they are to include in their strategic risk assessment. The risks are determined by experts from 15 government agencies who have provided their opinions on 14 different threats, which are then analysed and ranked by DEMA. The use of experts and a qualitative methodology leads to the question of how the SoK could be a factor that influences the national risk strategy and, thereby, the mitigation initiatives taken by private, public and non-governmental organisations. The paper utilises an analytical approach based on the sensemaking of experts, resulting in proposals for risk strategies in the NRP. The paper concludes that SoK has a significant but implicit role and that uncertainties can result in over or under-representation of threats by DEMA, which in turn can lead to faulty strategic risk governance decisions by the readers of the report.