Group clever to control rising chaos (8)
I believe the answer is:
assemble
'group' is the definition.
(I know that group is a more specific form of assemble)
'clever to control rising chaos' is the wordplay.
'clever' becomes 'able' (able can mean skilled or talented).
'to control' indicates putting letters inside.
'rising' says the letters should be written backwards (letters written upwards in a down clue).
'chaos' becomes 'mess' (I've seen this before).
'mess' backwards is 'ssem'.
'able' going around 'ssem' is 'ASSEMBLE'.
(Other definitions for assemble that I've seen before include "Get together" , "Gather together at meeting place" , "Build" , "Put together all the components" , "Come or bring group together" .)