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Greg Bankoff (Presenter: James K. Mitchell)
“Fair Game? Animal Vulnerability and Disasters in a Globalised World.”
For full paper (.pdf format) click here.
For conference presentation (.pdf format) click here.
Evidence of the increasing vulnerability of modern societies to natural hazards has been graphically demonstrated by the scale of death and devastation consequent upon the Indian Ocean Tsunami and Hurricane Katrina. The extensive media coverage of human suffering that such events engendered, however, only serves to obscure the fact that non-human actors are also adversely affected. Countless thousands of animal lives are lost during disasters or in the perils created by their aftermath. Moreover, little or no attention is paid to their plight by either rescue or aid organizations that are preoccupied with saving or relieving human distress.
While attempts to minimize, prepare for and manage the impact of hazards upon human societies has increasingly become a subject of more mainstream scholarly focus, little debate has been devoted to the changing relational vulnerability of animals to natural hazards. In particular, how has the spread of urbanization, modern methods of food production, and reductions to the extent of the ‘wild’ affected the exposure of pets, factory-farmed animals, and non-domesticates to risk? The loss of psychological companionship, sources of protein, work animals, beasts of burden and game clearly have untold consequences for human communities that have not been properly recognized. Using data from recent major disasters, this paper attempts to assess the changing nature of animal loss of life occasioned by such events as well as the impact their deaths have on different human populations.
Stephen Bender
“Disasters and Globalization: Revisiting and Refocusing on Vulnerability and Development”
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As policy, program and project actions by countries, regional governmental bodies, IFIs, bi-lateral development agencies, NGOs and the private sector continue to build a concern and constituency for focusing on the vulnerability of governments, production and social sectors, and private citizens to natural hazard events, it is an opportune moment to return to the consideration of a world concerned with, if not dedicated to, overcoming under-development. Development is about dealing with vulnerability so that dependency on external assistance (a disaster) is minimized. In fact being a developed country is about, in part, providing directed disaster assistance in order to promote selected agendas. Globalization as disaster assistance takes many forms in increasingly innovate ways affecting not only the recipients but also the donors. Perhaps the mainstreaming of disaster reduction in development has always been as close or as far away as development assistance itself.
Thomas Birkland, Pannapa Herabat, Richard Little and William Wallace
“The Impact of the Tsunami on Tourism in Thailand: Implications for Global Tourism”
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The December 2004 tsunami led to significantly fewer visitors to Thailand in the year after the event; this decline in tourism parallels sharp declines in terrorism after the Bali nightclub bombings, and the decline in tourism traffic and air travel in the United States after the September 11 attacks. We consider the impact that large, high profile disasters will have on global tourism in the future. Using the Thailand case, we argue that global saturation news coverage of these events leads to distorted perceptions of risk, and therefore depresses travel to an extent greater than that called for by the objective risk of a particular hazard. We believe these sudden drops in travel could be significant: one of the claimed benefits of "globalization," including open borders and the free flow of people and ideas, is the free flow of tourists to and from recreationally and culturally significant areas. Yet if disasters undermine confidence in travel and tourism, travel and the positive benefits it provides to a global economy will be diminished, if not lost. To the extent possible given uncertainties in the data, we will also compare and contrast this tourism disaster with the impact of Hurricane Katrina on tourism in New Orleans and its environs.
Monalisa Chatterjee
“Paradoxical Trade Offs of Globalization”
Lee Clarke
“Worst Case thinking and official failure in Katrina”
“There’s enough blame to go around for everybody.” That was the mantra after Katrina blasted the American gulf coast in September 2005. It was especially popular with federal officials, those who had the mandate, and enough power, to have ameliorated the hurricane’s damage. The problem with the mantra is that it distributes responsibility evenly. That is a mistake because if power—among officials and among organizations—is distributed unevenly then responsibility should be too.
One of the biggest official failures last September was one of imagination. Specifically, officials failed to develop and engage a worst-case imagination. That failure led them to be caught off-guard by what to many others seemed an obvious risk. But what is a worst-case imagination? It is one that emphasizes possibilities over probabilities; it emphasizes consequences of the likelihood that courses of events will occur. Probabilistic thinking has come to be equated with rationality itself. But this is a mistake. Possibilistic thinking can be usefully employed to counter-balance probabilism.
Craig Colten
For full paper (.pdf format) click here.
Public policy changes between Hurricane Betsy (1965) and Hurricane Katrina (2005)
Emily Gilbert
“Risk, Vulnerability and Geopolitical Relations in the ‘North American Community’ in the Wake of 9/11”
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In recent years Canadian and US relations have been fraught with tensions, from the trade of softwood lumber, to defense spending and missile defense, to same-sex marriage and the de-criminalization of marijuana. That tensions exist is not in itself new. But what has changed is that today none of these issues escapes being framed in terms of the terrorist attacks of 9/11. Risk and vulnerability underpin discussions about future geopolitical directions, with Canada particularly insecure about the recent tendencies towards protectionism and unilateralism by the US behemoth. The disaster of 9/11 has thus changed much, but also in many ways not much has changed. Indeed, advocates of deeper economic integration in Canada have used the terrorist attacks to push forward latent proposals for renegotiating free trade, perhaps along the lines of a customs union or a common market. Some steps towards reconfiguring deeper economic integration have in fact been set out in the North American Security and Prosperity Agreement, signed by the political leaders of the US, Canada and Mexico in March 2005. What is remarkable in this document, however, is the appeal for safety and security that it made to the continent’s citizens, ‘to our people in this and future generations.’ Moreover, these concerns are not confined to economic prosperity, but reach into matters relating to health, quality of life, and personal freedoms. How to understand this significant shift towards continental biopolitics and increasingly liberalizing economics, and how these relate to the disaster of 9/11, will be addressed in this paper
Kerry R. Hinds
“Business continuity in the insurance industry after 9/11”
The September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks that were unleashed on the United States sent shock waves throughout the entire world. These events had tremendous impacts on the United States as well as the rest of the world. The insurance industry was one such facet of the world economy that was affected by the horrific events. Clearly, the insurance industry was faced with the costliest single event in its history. Industry experts estimated that insured losses were between US$30-58 billion. (Towers Perrin 2002) No sector of the insurance industry was speared. Losses were realized in many insurance lines such as property, business interruptions, workers compensation, aviation liability, life and health, event cancellation amongst others. Preliminary reports from the Insurance Service Office August 2002 reported that a total of 51,000 claims had been filed. 49,000 claims were filed in New York and the other 2000 were filed in Virginia . This total figure however comprised only of 15,200 commercial claims; 31500 personal property claims and 4300 auto claims from New York and Virginia . (Hartwig 2002) Notably other insurance lines were affected by the events.
The objective of this paper is to examine and to evaluate the knowledge gained in the insurance and reinsurance industry from the events of Tuesday 11 September 2001. Most of the information embodied in the paper comes from documented reports from the various insurance industry experts.
The paper endeavors to addresses the following questions:
1. What losses did the insurance industry sustain?
2. How successfully did the insurance industry manage disaster recovery and business continuity?
3. What lessons were learnt?
4. How were these lessons learnt?
5 Who learnt the lessons?
6. How was this knowledge documented?
7. How has this knowledge been communicated to other individuals and organizations?
8. How effective has this knowledge transfer been?
9. What are the elements of a strategic crisis management capability for this type of organization?
Robin Leichenko and Karen O'Brien
“Double Exposure: Disaster Vulnerability Under Globalization and Global Environmental Change.”
James K. Mitchell
“The globalization of disaster recovery”
There is a growing debate about whether the process of globalization contributes to increasing the worldwide burden of natural disasters or reduces it. Expert opinion is unevenly divided about the issue with a majority expecting negative outcomes. Empirical analysis of links between globalization and disasters produces divergent conclusions, depending on the data sets and evaluation criteria employed. Amid this uncertainty it may be useful to employ an alternative analytic approach that focuses on the degree to which the previously successful existing hazard adjustments are likely to be favored or discouraged by globalization. Historically, hazard mitigation measures that are put in place during the post-disaster recovery period have offered the best prospects for preventing, avoiding or reducing subsequent disaster losses. Logic suggests that these may be among the least likely to benefit from globalization. Recent policy trends in the United States indicate that efforts to encourage mitigation also appear to be waning. It is likely that mitigation-sensitive disaster recovery programs will face an uphill struggle in a globalizing world.
Karen M. O'Neill
"National Sovereignty as a Limit to International Disaster Responses"
For full paper (.pdf format) click here
Regional floods and droughts are attracting international interest as possible signals of climate change. Those who aim to establish climate change policies ideally seek globalized responses. They have been profoundly disappointed by leaders acting within the constraints of national politics. The United States ' inaction has the most disappointing. There was widespread international astonishment about the slow response of the United States to Hurricane Katrina in 2005, but international observers can learn several lessons that are relevant to climate change policy:
Environmental policies, preparedness, and responses to weather disasters remain primarily based in the hands of the world's states.
The U.S. government's response, while undoubtedly incompetent, also reflected the structured fragmentation of duties across the federal system that purposefully limit coordinated action.
There is little tolerance in the U.S. for placing large areas of vulnerable land off limits to development. Making land available for development is not a sign of incompetence but is instead an assertion about the fundamental purpose of government in the United States , a different path to the common good than taken in most other countries.
Consistent with these ideas, an emerging theme from the Bush administration is that the proper response to climate change will be adaptation after effects emerge, rather than reducing possible effects by limiting carbon emissions now. The hurricane disaster shows that it will be difficult to present incentives for property owners and local governments to limit building on vulnerable lands and for organizing a broad public and governmental response to climate change.
E. L. Quarantelli
“Trans-system ruptures: the new disasters of the 21st century”
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Disasters are as old as when human beings started to live in groups. Initially the risks, which created the possibility for disasters, were primarily natural hazards such as earthquakes and floods. But through time, technological agents were added to the natural ones. For example, the development of synthetic chemicals in the 19th Century and nuclear power in the 20th Century, created the possibility of toxic chemical disasters and radiation fallout crises. This paper suggests that we are at another historical juncture with the appearance of a new kind of disaster, what we call trans-system social ruptures (TSSR). The label tries to indicate that these kinds of disasters jump to or cut across different social systems. Using examples, such as the spread of the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) and the SoBigF computer F virus in 2003, we describe the primary characteristics of TSSR. We also discuss examples of possible future TSSR that, among others, are rooted in biotechnological advances and the spread of globalization that create new social networks. The paper concludes with an effort to place TSSR within the full range of disasters, including old and traditional manifestations as well as ones with mixed old and new characteristics.
William Solecki and Robin Leichenko
“Globalization, Urban Environmental Change, and Local Vulnerability”
Helen T. Sullivan and Hiroshi Kawamura
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For conference presentation (.pdf format) click here.
“Disaster Preparedness for Vulnerable Populations: Determining Effective Strategies for Communicating Risk, Warning, and Response”
Vulnerable populations, including those with disabilities, the elderly, the situationally disabled, and those with special needs are at particular risk in a disaster. Communicating preparedness and warning information is critical for these groups, and recent events highlight that much work remains to be done in this area. Given the historical evidence that significant numbers of any population fail to respond or act upon warnings of imminent disaster, the question of how to deliver effective messages to those with perceptual, cognitive, communicative, or learning disabilities is all the more challenging. Additionally, tourists, recent immigrants, and refugees face challenges when confronted with disaster in unfamiliar locations, linguistically isolated, and in need of assimilating lifesaving guidance quickly.
The level of scientific and engineering research that has been applied to geological hazards, for example, needs now to be matched by new research that seeks to understand the psychological factors that affect the efficacy of communications and preparedness strategies for all populations.
In the context of disabilities, the application of technical solutions in the form of assistive technologies and accessible information can do much to enhance the communication of lifesaving information, yet there is little in the way of specific guidelines, and research, used by the developers of such systems.
This paper explores the challenges faced by vulnerable populations and discusses strategies that may prove effective in providing preparedness information to these groups. An ongoing project to develop accessible Tsunami preparedness information in Japan is described and the applicability of the results globally is discussed.
I. R. Tanali and J. R. Harrald (Presenter: Firoz Verjee)
“Effects of water infrastructure failure on response capabilities after hurricane Katrina”
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Hurricane Katrina demonstrated the consequences of mankind’s failure to reduce the vulnerability of physical infrastructure. The physical and human toll of this recent disaster and the slow and ineffective initial response efforts are connected to the near total failure of the city’s critical public infrastructure. This has intensified the problems and suffering of victims, and impaired the capability of responders to react. The failure of the levee system left New Orleans under floodwater, the destruction of road systems has severely limited access to the city and the ability to evacuate stranded residents, and has prevented the delivery of critical relief and energy supplies during the most critical stages of the disaster. The inadequate federal preparation for and execution of the response to Katrina has been severely criticized and led the FEMA director to resign. The infrastructure loss is the main discriminator between this event and prior near catastrophic events in U.S. history such as Hurricane Andrew and the Northridge Earthquake. The relationship between infrastructure resilience and the effectiveness of response is not understood or appreciated by emergency managers. If this relationship is better understood through the experience of Hurricane Katrina, it may help improve the mitigation of, response to, and recovery from future catastrophic events.- The proposed paper looks at the ramifications of water infrastructure failure from Katrina, and its effects on disaster response. What could have been done had there be better preparedness and response capability, and suggestions on better response for possible catastrophic event scenarios will be discussed.
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