The main purpose of this study was to analyze the causes, impacts and mechanisms of drought crisis management in rural and nomadic communities in Iran. 201 experts and managers involved in drought crisis management were surveyed through a complete enumeration/census. Face validity and content validity of the questionnaire were confirmed by experts. The calculated Cronbach’s alpha for the different sections of the instrument were 0.81, 0.76 and 0.72. The Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS 11.5) was used to treat and analyze the obtained data. Factor analysis was employed to analyze the data. Five components emerged from factor analysis of the causes of drought vulnerability including socio-economic factor (32.42% of the variance), livelihood factor (19.3% of the variance), hydrological factor (17.79% of the variance), agricultural factor (10% of the variance) and meteorological factor (9% of the variance). In a similar vein, four principal components including ecological and environmental impacts, economic and livelihood impacts, social impacts and psychological impacts were extracted using factor analysis. Additionally, five principal components were extracted from the factor analysis of management mechanisms. Considering these factors, a conceptual model has been proposed.