Clarine van Karnebeek
Clarine van Karnebeek (Januari 1972, Hengelo) has been working as a freelance investigative journalist. In her current researchproject, ‘Worstcase Scenarios’, she focuses on societal resilience against the threat of a large-scale crisis caused by a (cyber)attack, blackout, or climate disaster.
In her research, she takes the reader through the choices that municipalities, neighborhoods, and citizens are making or have already made to become more resilient. She also participated in cross-border research into the consequences of flooding caused by climate change in eight European countries.
Previously, she delved into ‘DASK,’ the Turkish earthquake insurance scheme, which affected Turkish-Dutch citizens following the 2023 earthquake. She also examined the question of why there are so few judges of color in the Netherlands, including a ‘WOO-verzoek’.
Clarine studied General Social Sciences in Utrecht, specializing in minorities and migration in Western Europe. She completed her studies with qualitative research into ‘Jewish Identity’ in post-war Berlin. Later, she obtained additional diplomas in photography, communication, and investigative journalism. She lived and worked in Paris, Berlin, Lima, and Sao Paulo, among other places. With her broad social orientation, she aims to interpret trends, social changes, and emerging problems in society.
In addition to her journalistic work, Clarine has been co-owner of Rumours Concept Store, an adventurous mini-department store in Rotterdam.
Expertise
Resilience, investigative research, signaling investigative journalism, worstcase scenarios, climate change, disaster, social orientation, trends in society, whole of society, all hasard, social change, citizens, local resilience, blackout, hybrid attack, earthquake, dask, bible belt, european cowboys
Recent publications
https://euobserver.com/200660/how-europe-risks-losing-the-battle-against-rising-flood-waters/
https://www.versbeton.nl/?p=120092&share_code=K1fSeikYPTlC
https://smallstreammedia.nl/artikelen/aardbevingsslachtoffer-turkije/
https://smallstreammedia.nl/artikelen/how-europe-risks-losing-the-battle-against-rising-waters/
Featured article
Rotterdam neighborhood Bloemhof practices disaster scenarios
In the event of a blackout, flood, or attack, you could easily find yourself sitting in the cold and dark for three days, barely in contact with the outside world. According to the government, people must therefore be able to fend for themselves for 72 hours during a disaster. This was practiced in the Bloemhof neighborhood. “I thought, ‘wow, all of that can happen.’ We were really confronted with the harsh reality.”
On a weekday evening in April 2025, an unusual delegation enters the ‘Huis van de Wijk Irene’, a welfare organization in the Bloemhof neighborhood. The delegation consists of about twenty people working in all sectors of society. Managers from commercial companies such as business services provider Deloitte and multinational Ahold, but also from the Dutch Red Cross, a handful of Rotterdam civil servants, and executives from the Rotterdam-Rijnmond Safety Region. Even Mayor Carola Schouten joins them. Together with fifty involved local residents, they are conducting an informal experiment: what if the power goes out for 72 hours?
Small Stream Media investigated this question in a cross-border study that maps worst-case scenarios and floods in eight European countries and shows how Europe is responding to one of the most urgent and complex consequences of climate change. This article also appeared at VersBeton in Rotterdam.
What did the results show? It is to be hoped that resilience and self-reliance will become a hot topic among municipal councilors as well, because there is still a lot of work to be done on worst-case scenarios at the neighborhood level.
Since geopolitical relations in the world have started to shift, the government has been warning of emergency scenarios and urging self-reliance for at least 72 hours. The government campaign ‘Denk Vooruit’ (Think Ahead) is intended to help with this; the information booklet *Prepare for an Emergency* has since landed on everyone’s doormat in the Netherlands.