Visibility Without Guidance: Measuring the Actionability of Public Crisis Communication in Lebanon
This study audits 182 crisis communications from Lebanese institutions and UN agencies during the April–May 2026 conflict escalation, revealing a significant gap between informational output and actionable guidance, with state sources performing notably worse than humanitarian partners in providing specific, directive advice to affected populations.
Original paper licensed under CC BY 4.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). This is an AI-generated explanation of the paper below. It is not written or endorsed by the authors. For technical accuracy, refer to the original paper. Read full disclaimer
Imagine a massive storm is brewing, and the sky is full of warning sirens. You are standing outside, looking up, waiting for instructions. The sirens are loud, and the news is everywhere. But here is the problem: the sirens tell you that a storm is coming, but they don't tell you where the shelter is, what to pack, or how to get there.
This is exactly what the paper "Visibility Without Guidance" is about.
The author, Mohamed Soufan, looked at 182 public messages sent by Lebanese government agencies, emergency teams, and UN organizations during a specific period of conflict in early 2026. He wanted to answer one simple question: Did these messages actually tell people what to do to stay safe, or did they just tell them that something bad was happening?
Here is the breakdown of his findings, using some everyday analogies.
1. The "Menu" vs. The "Meal"
Think of crisis communication like a restaurant menu.
- Visibility is just listing the ingredients on the menu. It says, "We have soup."
- Actionability is handing you a bowl of soup and a spoon. It says, "The soup is in the kitchen, here is the spoon, and you should eat it now."
The study found that most institutions were busy printing menus but rarely serving the meal. Out of a perfect score of 5 (representing a message that tells you where, what to do, how to get help, when to do it, and who it is for), the average message only scored a 2.
2. The "Missing Phone Number" Problem
The biggest gap the study found was like a doctor giving you a diagnosis but refusing to give you the prescription or the pharmacy address.
- The Finding: Nearly 90% of the messages did not include a phone number, a website, or a specific place where people could get help.
- The Analogy: Imagine a fire alarm going off in a building. The alarm screams "Fire!" (Visibility). But if the alarm doesn't point to the exit or tell you which door is open, you are still trapped. The study found that while institutions were screaming "Fire," they were rarely pointing to the exit.
3. The "Reporters" vs. The "Guides"
The author sorted the messages into different types and found a clear pattern:
- The Reporters (Situation Reports): These were the most common messages (like news updates). They said, "A strike happened in this village." They told people what happened, but not what to do next. These messages scored very low on actionability.
- The Guides (Warnings & Alerts): These were rare. They said, "Evacuate this village immediately; here is the bus stop." These messages scored very high.
The study found that the "Reporters" were shouting the loudest, drowning out the "Guides."
4. Who Was Doing the Best Job?
The author compared three groups of messengers, like three different teams in a relay race:
- The UN Agencies (The Organized Team): These groups (like UNHCR and UNICEF) were the best at giving instructions. Their messages were like well-written instruction manuals. They scored the highest because they used structured reports that naturally included "where," "when," and "how."
- The Emergency Responders (The Mixed Team): Groups like the Army and Civil Defense were in the middle. The Army did a decent job giving specific directions, but the Civil Defense and Red Cross often just reported on the situation without giving clear next steps.
- The Government Ministries (The Silent Team): Surprisingly, the government ministries (like Health and Social Affairs), who sent the most messages, were the least helpful. They sent a huge volume of updates, but most of them were just descriptions of the crisis without any practical advice. It's like a traffic cop standing in the middle of a jam, waving his arms and saying, "Traffic is bad," but never pointing anyone toward a detour.
5. The Bottom Line
The paper concludes that during this crisis, the institutions were very good at being seen (Visibility) but very bad at being useful (Guidance).
- The Gap: There is a huge gap between "knowing something is happening" and "knowing how to survive it."
- The Cause: It wasn't that the organizations were silent; it was that their messages were designed to inform rather than to direct. They treated the public like an audience watching a news report, rather than people needing a survival guide.
In short: The study found that while the lights were on and the sirens were blaring, the map to the exit was missing from 9 out of 10 messages. The author suggests that if these organizations want to save lives, they need to stop just describing the storm and start telling people exactly how to build a shelter.
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