Not an oil shock. An everything shock. With Bruce Mann

What happens when one of the world’s most important maritime choke points stays closed for months?

Alex Evans speaks to former UK resilience tsar Bruce Mann about the real-world consequences of the prolonged closure of the Strait of Hormuz, and why the biggest impacts may still lie ahead.

Bruce draws on decades of experience in civil contingencies, emergency planning, and systemic risk analysis to explain how an oil shock can rapidly evolve into a manufacturing shock, food shock, economic shock, and eventually a social and political crisis.

The conversation explores:

• Cascading failures in globally interconnected systems
• Why governments may be undercommunicating risk
• The dangers of “Big Mother” government responses
• How communities and households can build practical resilience
• The difference between panic and preparedness
• Whether globalization created hidden fragilities
• Why crises can sometimes produce genuine breakthroughs

People

Alex Evans is the founder and Executive Director of Larger Us. He’s also a Visiting Professor in Practice at Newcastle University’s School of Arts and Cultures, a Senior Fellow at New York University’s Center on International Cooperation, and the author of The Myth Gap: What Happens When Evidence and Arguments Aren’t Enough? (Penguin, 2017).

Alex is a former Campaign Director at Avaaz, where he ran campaigns on areas including Brexit and human rights. He’s also been a political adviser, including for two UK Secretaries of State for International Development and in the UN Secretary-General’s office, and as a consultant for organisations from Oxfam to the US National Intelligence Council.

Bruce Mann

Bruce Mann’s career in the UK Civil Service covered a wide range of national security policy and operational roles in the Ministry of Defence and Cabinet Office, including as Head of the Nuclear Accident Response Organisation and in the Cabinet Office Secretariat dealing with terrorism and major emergencies. He was appointed in 2004 to be Director of the Civil Contingencies Secretariat in the Cabinet Office, where he led the UK Government response to a wide range of domestic emergencies. 

After leaving the Civil Service, Bruce has provided support to a wide range of countries in eastern Europe, the Gulf and East Asia, as well as English Local Resilience Forums, seeking to develop their risk and emergency management strategies, law and capabilities, and to assess their preparedness.  Bruce was Leader of the Independent Review of UK Civil Protection arrangements on behalf of the National Preparedness Commission, of which body he is a Commissioner. He was also an Expert Witness and Adviser to the UK COVID-19 Inquiry. He holds an Honorary Doctorate of Bournemouth University Disaster Management Centre. He is a Fellow of the Institute of Strategic Risk Management and a member of its Global Advisory Board; and a member of the Advisory Board of Safehouse Pro, a Community Interest Company established to advance community and household preparedness as the foundation of wider societal resilience. He is also a Senior Associate of the UK Resilience Academy.

Further Reading

2022 Review of UK civil contingencies arrangements

Bruce’s evidence to the Covid-19 Inquiry, with Professor David Alexander

Bournemouth University report on UK household resilience

Government survey of public attitudes on risk perception, resilience and preparedness 

Essay on the UK National Preparedness Commission by Lord Toby Harris