many years it has been accepted that disasters are caused by underlying societal issues such as vulnerabilities and inequalities, and not by an ‘Act of God’ hazard. As Tierney (2014) states, ‘the origins of disaster lie not in nature, and not in technology, but rather in the ordinary everyday workings of society itself’.
After the destructive 1755 Lisbon earthquakes, in a letter young French philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau challenged the great French philosopher Voltaire's view that the event was how God showed His power, glory, and might. Rousseau noted that nature did not construct thousands of buildings and houses of six to seven storeys that collapsed in the earthquakes. Some academics claim that Rousseau's letter to Voltaire symbolised the beginning of the shift in thinking leading to the socially-constructed interpretation of disaster events.
In 1976, O'Keefe et al. used empirical global economic loss data to show that social-economic and not natural factors should be seen as responsible for both the loss of many lives and the loss/damages of assets in the developing world. Since then, numerous researchers (e.g. Burton et al. 1993; Wisner et al. 2004; Bankoff et al. 2007) have demonstrated this interpretation. The United Nations International Strategy for Disaster Reduction (2018) has adopted the critical approach to disasters by suggesting that ‘there is no such thing as a “natural” disaster, only natural hazards’.
1.4 Disasters and Communities
If disasters are socially constructed, then the role of people and their communities should be prominent. ‘Without humans and their pertinent societal spheres, hazards are simply natural events and thus irrelevant; hence much attention should be paid by concerned institutions to people and communities and their capacity to engage with nature, both as a resource and as a hazard’ (Haque and Etkin 2012).
What do we mean by ‘community’ in the disaster context? The term tends to be ambiguous; it is not necessarily only designated by a group of interacting people sharing the same place and similar understandings, values, or life practices. As Oliver-Smith (2005) points out, ‘community’ is a cultural field with a complex of symbols and, as such, possesses an identity and is capable of acting on its behalf or on behalf of those who have a claim on that identity. In that sense, community is not clearly defined and cannot be easily measured.
Titz et al. (2018) argue that ‘community’ is elusive because ‘it either escapes clear definitions or is described by too many, and it is deceiving because it has become so popular in (disaster) research and action that barely anyone bothers to question its legitimacy and usefulness’. These authors contend that ‘community’ should be replaced by more precise concepts such as neighbourhoods or social networks, e.g. a religious or ethnic group.
To support this argument, in this book general reference is made to ‘community education’ with ‘community’ used as a synonym with ‘social’, ‘civic’, or ‘public’ (each of which are used across the world in this sense). In Chapter 11, the community is broken down into community sectors for the purpose of targeting disaster learning. Elsewhere, the community discussed is clearly defined, e.g. a population at risk to a certain probability of flooding.
1.5 Learning
Given that disasters are socially constructed and the role of at-risk people and their communities in disasters is critical, then learning by these people and their communities before, during, and after a disaster is paramount. This contention is supported by the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015–2030 (United Nations 2015), endorsed by countries across the world, which in several instances promotes the need for disaster-related learning in its actions, including ‘to promote national strategies to strengthen public education and awareness in disaster risk reduction, including disaster risk information and knowledge, through campaigns, social media and community mobilization, taking into account specific audiences and their needs’.
This book examines the nature of disaster learning and how it can be made most effective.
A major challenge in disaster-related learning is that in comparison to other forms of personal civic learning (e.g. road safety, health, waste management, financial management), a disaster (or even an emergency) may never occur in one's lifetime. On the other hand, people learn to manage money on a regular basis, to be constantly wary of road and other transport hazards, and to be aware of lifelong risks to their health.
References
1 Alexandra, T., Cannon, T., and Krüger, F. (2018). Uncovering ‘community’: challenging an elusive concept. Development and Disaster Related Work Societies 8: 71.
2 Bankoff, G., Frerks, G., and Hilhorst, D. (2007). Mapping Vulnerability: Disasters, Development and People. London: Earthscan.
3 Burton, I., Kates, R., and White, G. (1993). Environment as Hazard, 2e. New York: Guilford Press.
4 Centre for Research on the Epidemiology of Disasters (2018). Economic Losses, Poverty & Disasters 1998–2017. Report produced in conjunction with the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction.
5 Haque, C.E. & Etkin, D. (2012). Dealing with disaster risk and vulnerability: people, community and resilience perspectives. In: Disaster Risk and Vulnerability: Mitigation Through Mobilizing Communities and Partnerships, (eds C.E. Haque & D. Etkin), McGill-Queen's University Press. Montreal, Canada, 3–27.
6 Kelman, I. (2018). Lost for words amongst disaster risk science vocabulary? International Journal of Disaster Risk Science 9 (2): 281–291.
7 O'Keefe, P., Westgate, K., and Wisner, B. (1976). Taking the naturalness out of natural disasters. Nature 260: 566–567.
8 Oliver-Smith, A. (2005). Communities after catastrophe. In: Community Building in the Twenty-First Century (ed. S.E. Hyland), 25–44. Santa Fe, USA: School of American Research Press.
9 Tierney, K. (2014). The Social Roots of Risk: Producing Disasters, Promoting Resilience. Stanford, USA: Stanford University Press.
10 United Nations (2015). Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015–2030. Available: https://www.unisdr.org/we/inform/publications/43291.
11 United Nations International Strategy for Disaster Reduction (2018). What is disaster risk reduction? [Online]. Available: https://www.unisdr.org/who-we-are/what-is-drr (accessed 11 June 2019).
12 United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (2017). Terminology on disaster risk reduction. [Online]. Available: https://www.unisdr.org/we/inform/terminology (accessed 11 June 2019).
13 Wisner, B., Blaikie, P., Cannon, T., and Davis, I. (2004). At Risk: Natural Hazards, People's Vulnerability and Disasters, 2e. New York: Routledge.
2 Disaster ECE
2.1 Disaster Education
2.1.1 Defining Disaster Education
Disaster education is becoming increasingly popular as a means of ensuring public safety, knowing that governments and infrastructure cannot protect all individuals and their communities in all emergencies. People need to look after themselves and others during and after disasters, and thus need to be educated in how to do this.
There is a strong involvement by emergency agencies around the world in disaster education. However, most agencies only commit relatively small proportions of their budgets to it, especially compared to those for emergency operations.
Ironically, although there are a multitude of avenues for education implementation related to disasters, there is according to Preston (2012) ‘surprisingly