ITIL v3 classifies problem management as "proactive" and "reactive". In my opinion, this classification some times confuses the practitioners.  My interpretation is, if the problem management immediately follows an incident, it is "reactive problem management". If the problem management is to prevent incidents from occuring or based on a medium term trend, it is "proactive".

Consider the following examples:

• Service Desk - only for high severity incidents
• second level - if they suspect an incident or group of incidents need further investigation
• trend analysis of incidents
• Inputs from Demand/Capacity management

In the above classification, 1 and 2 will be classified as "reactive" problem management.   Trend analysis, inputs from demand/capacity management (3 and 4) will be classified as "proactive" problem managment.

Cheers

Murali