Vision Zero on Fire Safety
Authors: Andersson Ragnar , Gell Thomas 
Published: November 2022

Since 2010, Sweden has a Vision Zero policy on fire safety: no one should die or be seriously injured as a result of fire. Compared to the traffic safety model, however, the preconditions for successful implementation appear more immature and less convincing in the fire area. The purpose of this chapter is to illustrate, using the Vision Zero policy on fire safety as an example, how a Vision Zero initiative in a new area, where the conditions for governance may differ significantly from the area of inspiration, can be dealt with as a dynamic process to gradually establish credibility and effectiveness.

Globally, fire is a significant cause of death and injury. The general trend is toward a slow decline, especially among middle-income and high-income countries. The decline may be due to successful fire safety efforts, but also to other conditions affecting it indirectly. Both risk-increasing and risk-reducing factors determine fire safety. Risk increasing factors include an ageing population, an increasing diversity of possible ignition sources, and a change in the composition and amount of combustible materials present in our homes. The risk-reducing factors include generally favorable socioeconomic and technological developments, including concrete societal actions directed against fire risks such as the promotion of smoke detectors and sprinkler systems.

Fire safety is one of the oldest documented examples of societal risk management. City planning and construction were early influenced by fire safety considerations, while in contrast, the legal responsibility for residential fire safety has largely remained a private and individual matter. The situation is similar to the one that for long prevailed in the traffic sector, that is, the primary responsibility rests with the system’s users, not with its designers.

The launch of the Vision Zero on fire safety in 2010 represented a clear boost in ambition. Along with the vision, a strategy intended to guide the work toward the visionary goal was also presented. The strategy included four items: information, technical solutions, local collaboration, and evaluation/research. Several actions were taken in line with the strategy, including a significant research effort and the development of a set of indicators to monitor progress.

Ten years later, the research effort has brought new knowledge that puts previous perceptions into partly new light. The notion that survival depends on the individual’s personal capacities is strengthened. Adverse outcomes such as death and serious injury appear mainly linked to specific vulnerabilities of certain groups for medical and social reasons. Most fires are handled by the residents themselves without injuries and without assistance from Rescue Services; on the other hand, even minor fires can be fatal for vulnerable residents. This turns the problem framing toward social aspects rather than technical, since broad groups of residents lack the capacities needed, conflicting with the prevailing view that the individual should bear the primary responsibility.

Other findings relate to the proven inefficiency of certain measures for groups at elevated risk and the need for re-thinking and innovations to meet the challenges ahead. This includes extended inter-sectoral collaboration on a broader spectrum of residential risks besides fire, threatening the same groups for similar social and medical reasons.

This updated state of knowledge is now being used as a basis for renewing current national fire safety strategies. With reference to general principles of systems control, this chapter will discuss obstacles and challenges to establish a more robust and systematic national control of the fire problem in line with the Vision Zero policy. The appropriateness of launching Vision Zero policies in fields that are not yet ripe for systematic governance is also discussed. It is concluded that a Vision Zero initiative can still be meaningful and successfully pursued, provided that limitations in the ability to influence crucial elements in the system are openly identified and systematically addressed in a process in which strategical and policy developments interact with research and innovation.