Shaping the Crisis Perception of Decision Makers and Its Application to Singapore's Voluntary Contributions to Post-Tsunami Reconstruction Efforts

Decision making is one of the most important stages in the process of policymaking, especially when decision makers face crises. Departing from the policy process framework, this paper focuses on the stage of public policy decision making in terms of perception formulation of decision makers in face of crisis. In this paper, the process and content of perception in decision making have been studied, and contested, along with the principles of new public management. The factors that contribute to perception shaping are decomposed, categorized into mechanisms of driving forces and restraining forces, and embraced by policy subsystem context, along with the decision flow towards an outcome of strategic decision. Building on the conceptual framework, an empirical case study of Singapore Red Cross in 2004 post‐tsunami reconstruction of Aceh Indonesia is presented to compare and contrast the conceptual framework as an example of perception formulation in crisis decision‐making.