Uppsala Studies in Education

filosofie doktorsexamen Doctor philosophiae Pedagogikum, Sydney Alrutz-salen, Blåsenhus, von Kraemers allé 1, Uppsala A societal crisis is an emergency that affects many people and large parts of society, threatening life, health, safety and basic values. In a societal crisis, there is a need for coordination between various bodies in the society. Coordination in societal crises has previously been studied mainly from a management perspective. Learning perspectives have been studied to a lesser extent. The main purpose of this thesis is to increase knowledge about the conditions for developing consensus and establish a common understanding of synergy-effects, a surplus value, for knowledge meetings between individuals from different organizations when they cooperate in the emergency management system. The study seeks to understand to the following questions: 1) What images and ideas do participants bring into the coordination group about societal crisis, how have they developed and changed? 2) How do the participants act when they have different pictures and meet? 3) Can the basic ideas of the research circle be used for knowledge building at knowledge meetings in the emergency management-system? 4) Can the basic ideas of the research circle be used to develop consensus and establish a common understanding of synergy-effects before societal crises happen? The main study consists of three case studies in three different-sized municipalities. It is based on 36 semi-structured interviews with participants in local crisis management coordination groups, observations during exercises and meetings, document studies and an experiment with the so-called knowledge meeting. The results are compared with complementary studies from two knowledge meetings and two coordination exercises based on observation, questionnaires and evaluations. The individuals, organizations, and structures have been identified as frame factors for coordination groups. The results show that the participants have different images of societal crisis and that coordination is a time-consuming approach requiring cross-perspective learning, interaction, as well as dialogue and reflection skills. The participants eventually develop their crisis learning, i.e. conflict-filled adaptation. A system's opened nature is important for individual learning. degree of Doctor of Philosophy Docteur ès lettres A societal crisis is an emergency that affects many people and large parts of society, threatening lif