Governance in support of integrated flood risk management? The case of Romania

•Sustainable flood risk management demands an integrated approach.•A structure for flood risk governance can be described in terms of five dimensions.•A supportive governance context combines a high extent with a high coherence.•The extent and coherence of Romania’s flood risk governance structure increased.•Additional efforts are needed to increase cooperation and coordination across actors.

Building on an existing model of governance, this paper aims to assess the supportiveness of Romania׳s structural flood risk governance context towards integrated flood risk management. We assert that a governance structure supports the development and implementation of integrated flood risk management policies when it takes into account all relevant levels, actors, perceptions, strategies and resources (high extent) and has connections between these various dimensions (high coherence). The assessment shows that, in Romania, both the extent and coherence of flood risk governance has increased in recent years. However, the actual inclusion of actors, strategies and perceptions is lagging behind and actors do not actively look for integration or synergy. Thus, the governance structure is at times restrictive rather than supportive of integrated flood risk management as promoted in international guidelines and the European Floods Directive. We conclude that to effectively reduce flood risk problems, additional efforts and time are needed to further align policies and to change practices. Governance assessment can support responsible actors in this process by identifying the factors that support and restrict integrated, and thus sustainable, flood risk management.