[PhD defence] 20/10/2025 - François Grunewald: "Faced with uncertainty and danger: the role of the 'knowledge-experience' binomial in decision-making in crisis management" (UPR JPEG)

Mr François GRUNEWALD will publicly defend his thesis entitled: "Facing uncertainty and danger: the role of the 'knowledge-experience' pair in decision-making in crisis management", directed by Mr François FULCONIS and Mr Gilles PACHE, on Monday 20 October 2025.

Laboratory

UPR 3788 -JPEG - Legal, Political, Economic and Management Sciences Laboratory

Composition of the jury

Mr François FULCONIS	Avignon University	Thesis supervisor
Mr Gilles PACHE	Aix Marseille University	Thesis co-director
Ms Sophie MIGNON	University of Montpellier	Examiner
Ms Elodie KACIOUI-MAURIN	Aix-Marseille University	Examiner
Jean-Philippe Denis	Paris Saclay University	Rapporteur
Ms Cecile CORNOU	University of Grenoble Alpes (UGA)	Rapporteur
Mr Bruno MAESTRACCI	SDIS du 77	Guest

Summary

Faced with increasingly complex and multifactorial crises, marked by growing interactions between climate change and conflicts over resources, between urban vulnerabilities and socio-economic imbalances, between national policies and global geopolitics, crisis managers are confronted with multiple and growing uncertainties, which accompany the evolution of these contexts and the management of information flows.

In these increasingly unpredictable situations, decision-makers have to take into account a large number of parameters in order to meet the challenges of prevention, reducing the severity and impact of crises on populations, the quality of crisis recovery, and the challenges of learning. Decision-making in crisis management is an inherently difficult process, which takes place under numerous pressures, including the pressure of time. Beyond protocols and procedures, taking into account knowledge of the contexts and dynamics of specific crises, on the one hand, and the experience of those involved, on the other, could be a key element in improving decision-making processes in crisis management.

Faced with situations of fragility, the analysis of which would make it possible to define prevention strategies, with rapid-onset crises during which decision-makers are often confronted with a knowledge deficit at the start of the crisis, followed by information saturation, and finally with post-crisis situations which require an understanding of the roots of the crisis and what happened during it, the 'knowledge-experience' pairing can significantly improve decision-making in crisis management. The combination of improving the various ways of increasing knowledge and facilitating the flow of information to decision-making levels, as well as learning and training efforts, offers some interesting options.

By making better use of individual and collective experience, encouraged by an institutional and political courage that allows risk-taking and accepts intuitions, these efforts will improve the quality of decision-making in critical situations.

Keywords Crises, knowledge, management, uncertainty, decision, danger