An emergency is commonly defined by promptness, existential threat, and extraordinary response.

Evidence

Yet what is an emergency? There would probably be some consensus that the word denotes a situation that requires prompt attention, threatens the sustained existence of the subject, and calls for extraordinary actions on the part of others. — Michael Lipsky, Street-Level Bureaucracy, 1015

Categorization

• DEFINE: Sets the baseline definition against which administrative misuse of ‘emergency’ can be measured.
• XREF: Usable as the control definition in any argument about discretion drift — compare practitioner usage to this standard.