- Email: [email protected]
Reconstruction following disaster
Books
163
A necessary bandwagon K. N. Westgate Review of the Priovity Subject Area: Natural Disasters United Nations Environment Programme Report number 3 49 pages, no price stated (Nairobi, UNEP, 1977) International Disaster Relief: Toward a Responsive System Stephen Green 101 pages, $3.95 1977)
(New York, McGraw-Hill,
Reconstruction Following Disaster edited by J. Eugene Haas, Robert W. Kates and Martyn J. Bowden 331 pages, ES.10 (Cambridge, Mass, and London, MIT Press, 1977) Perhaps one of the most vital problems which will concern mankind through the 1980s and beyond is the increasing scale of deaths and damage resulting from disasters, whether “natural” or Although statistically not “man-made”. conclusive, the signs from the patchy data available are not encouraging. Moreover, the greatest increase in losses appears to be in countries ill-equipped to withstand such shock-the Third world. l It seems appropriate therefore, while scientists are unable to control the natural environment on any scale or with any certainty, to concentrate efforts on the reduction of death and destruction, and on the curbing of vulnerability to extreme environmental events. These apparent trends in the magnitude of disaster losses have begun to be appreciated by academics, individuals, and organisations, in disaster-related K. N. Westgate is at the Project Planning Centre for developing countries, University of Bradford, UK.
FUTURES
April 1878
occupations. Suddenly, the breadth of the problem has promoted urgency: the result of this awakening has been a rapid proliferation of literature. Conflicting theories, approaches, and methodologies have emerged with lightning speed at a time when simple but effective action is required. The need for detailed and relevant study, however, is urgent. The disaster bandwagon may be regretted; yet, nevertheless, it may be a necessary evil, in order to allow dedicated scholars to come to grips with the reality. The problem is to sort the wheat from the chaff. Stephen Green’s essay is certainly a timely reminder that there is a need for speedy and effective solutions. Population increases and political pressures may lead to future disasters of cataclysmic proportions. The problem, for Green, is to be found in the management of individual many of which are not disasters, brought to the world’s attention until some considerable time after the emergency has occurred. This is particularly true of the more discrete, more pervasive type of disaster-as Green’s experiences as a UNICEF worker in the recent Ethiopian famine have indicated. 2 The international
responsibility
The reasons for this silence can often be found in the degree of instability within a national government and the fact that many of the international relief organisations, both private and public, are bound to secrecy-and to withhold assistance-until the national government states otherwise. Both relief itself, and the logistics of administration and
164
Books
distribution, must come under scrutiny, according to Green. There are, perhaps, too many organisations attempting to fill similar roles, while national governments often confuse the situation by overstating relief requirements, for political and commercial ends, by political or ethnic partiality in relief distribution, or because of corruption. For Green the prescription is clear: the international relief system must be reorganised immediately. The international coordination of disaster relief has long been an ideal of frustrated relief workers; Green’s appraisal of current and future relief potential obviously draws upon his own valuable field experiences. He visualises a stronger United Disaster Nations Relief Office (UNDRO) as the hub of this reorganisation, emphasising that whatever the national relief capabilities may be, there should be one and only one global focal point for international disaster relief-and that should be UNDRO in Geneva (page 48). A change of emphasis But is international disaster relief both creditable and necessary? This may not be the case. Any increase in the scale of international disaster operations, however well streamlined, can only add to the confusion and create greater opportunities for misappropriation and corruption within recipient countries. There is, indeed, reason enough for wanting to reduce international reliefmuch of it is irrelevant and superfluous, serving only to appease the Western conscience. If reorganisation means placing the emphasis on necessity, then reorganisation would be most welcome. But if it means putting all relief organisations under one umbrella, then the emphasis is wrong A decrease in the scale of operations, and a shift of the resources thus freed into development planning programmes which include comprehensive attention
to disaster vulnerability, is imperative. This principle is already accepted by UNDRO. 3 Green also suggests the establishment of a convention, similar to the Geneva Convention,
. . . through which signatory states would establish theprincifile of international responsibility for the relief of the human effects of major natural disasters. The convention would equate the denial or delay of relief to disaster victims with denial of the most basic of human rights-the right to life (pages 65-66). The convention would designate a body to implement this “principle of shared responsibility”, eg some neutral international organisation such as the Red Cross parent bodies-the League of Red Cross Societies and the International Conference of the Red Cross-who instigated the concept of shared responsibility for natural disasters after World War 1. Again the prescription is unrealistic. The past few years has seen the gradual erosion of whatever “power” the UN system may have had, and individual nation states can easily and effectively bypass the Geneva Convention, if they feel it is in their own interests to do so. Rampant nationalism among smaller countries is evident, and shows no sign of abating; the superpowers can only glower across conference tables. While Green’s sentiments may be laudable, they are also naive, and do not reflect the complex nature of international political bickering. The political motive for much relief aid is now well documented.4 With so many vested interests at stake it is difficult to conceive of a truly effective and responsible attitude to disasters in any
f orm. A parochial
approach
While Green’s emphasis is on international response during the emergency period, the volume Reconstruction Following Disaster extends the temporal interest to the periods of rebuilding and
FUTURES
April 1978
Books
rehabilitation. Based on four case studies, two current and two historical, the study examines chiefly the reestablishment of homes and jobs after disaster. The four case studies are the San Francisco earthquake of 1906, the Anchorage, Alaska, earthquake of 1964, the Rapid City, South Dakota, flash flood of 1972 and the Managua, Nicaragua, earthquake of the same year. The reasons for this study are clear: there is very little detailed examination of the reconstruction period following a major disaster. The volume, therefore, could fill an important gap in the research literature. Unfortunately, the editors chose otherwise. When the Managua earthquake occurred in December 1972, researchers
. . . were asked to carry out a preliminary assessment of the events in Nicaragua to see if some type of research there could provide findings of signiJicancefor United States cities in /zig/zseismic risk areas . . . [page xvii, my italics). The editors further
state that almost
. . . no research had been done on the problems, issues and alternative solutions during reconstruction following disasters, and there was none involving cross-cultural comparisons (page xvii, my italics). The emphasis is clear. The reason for cross-cultural comparison is to extract information relevant to US cities in high seismic risk areas. It has already been noted that much of the increase in disaster losses is shouldered by countries from the Third world. Yet literature from the USA remains parochial-and strong in the belief that whatever is relevant for the USA can be projected into other situations with comparative ease. This is a dangerous assumption. The problem for the US researcher is that very often his funding agency will not allow him to focus objectively upon the world. So Reconstruction Following Disaster fails where it could have succeeded. Had Managua not been included the
FUTURES
April lS78
165
study could have had credence. The study of Managua, however, is superficial and lacks an understanding of the that create underdevelopprocesses ment-processes which probably produced a greater disaster than would otherwise have occurred. Disaster
in context
The volume is specifically directed at the policy-maker and planner and attempts to answer specific questions: Should there be changes in land use ? Should the building codes be changed ? Should there be compensation for private property losses? How should family and personal problems be handled ? To answer some of these problems the authors use case study and scenario techniques. But such questions may never arise for a considerable proportion of the population in a city like Managua, where there was a shortfall of 80% on the housing stock before the and where rural-urban earthquake, migration produced squatter settlements of great squalor and poverty in and around the city. For these people, the disaster began before the earthquake. Many attempts have been made to join the disaster bandwagon-in the interests of high science, for humanitarian reasons, or in pursuit of sensationalism. Many attempts have failed because they do not understand the priorities, and do not comprehend the nature of the problems they intend to attack. Specifically, the mounting losses in the Third world cannot be met by resorting to the large and cumbersome international bodies so beloved of defenders of freedom. 6 The UN Environment Programme document Review of a Priority Subject Area: Natural Disasters underlines the weakness of such bodies. The document surveys current research activity and knowledge on the natural phenomena which cause disasters, and on measures for the mitigation of such disasters. The
166
Books
document is, however, not comprehensive, and its very brevity and simplicity often lends a certain banality to comments such as: When feasible, the restriction of human settlements to low risk areas offers enormous advantages (page 13).
Vulnerability:
the priority
Werner
1. See, for example,
2.
area
Similarly, the highly developed research tradition of the West (particularly the USA), based on premises developed from the study of its own disasters, has little meaning for the countries where the need is greatest. Disasters in the Third world will only be effectively tackled when their relationship with development policies and planning is appreciated, when disasters are no longer treated as isolated events but as part of one, dynamic environment, when promotion of self-reliance by individual countries is seen as the major focus of disaster mitigation, and when vulnerability is viewed as the priority area. All the international relief and aid in the world may still leave populations vulnerable: the reduction of that vulnerability is the key to reducing overall losses.6
Revealing
Notes and references
the irrational
3.
4.
5.
6.
A. Baird, P. O’Keefe, K. Westgate, and B. Wisner, Towards an and Reduction of Disaster Explanation Proneness, Disaster Research Unit Occasional Paper 11, University of Bradford, UK, 1975. An excellent case study of the Ethiopian famine, with an afterword by Stephen Green, is Jack Shepherd’s T’ Politics of Starvation (Washington DC, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 1975). The UNDRO view is expressed by Faruk Berkol, Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations Disaster Relief disasters: a Coordinator in “Natural neglected variable in national development strategies”, International Social Science Journal, 28 (4), pages 730-735. See the discussion of these international relief aspects by Laurie Wiseberg, “An international perspective on the African famines”, in M. H. Glantz ed, The Politics of .Natural Disaster: the Case of the Sahel Drought (New York, Praeger, 1976), pages 101-127. See Lord Chalfont, “The UN could build success out of disaster”, The Times, 6 December 1976. long-term preventive The case for planning is given in P. O’Keefe and “Preventive planning for K. Westgate, Long-Range Planning, June disasters”, 1977,10, pages 25-29.
man
Hirsch
The JoyZess Economy Tibor Scitovsky 310 pages, El.95 (London, versity Press, 1976)
Oxford
Uni-
It came as a great shock in 1965 when students rioted at the University of California at Berkeley. It was the beginning of a wave of student unrest The author is Professor of Economics at the University of California, Los Angeles, California 90024, USA.
which rapidly spread to Columbia, Harvard, Yale, and others, finally spilling over into Germany, Japan, France, and the UK. During those hectic days, Tibor Scitovsky was teaching economics at Berkeley, and it must have been ironic and puzzling to him that most of the student leaders were from middle- and upper-middle-class backgrounds. Why would young men and born into affluence, be so women,
FUTURES
April 1978
163
A necessary bandwagon K. N. Westgate Review of the Priovity Subject Area: Natural Disasters United Nations Environment Programme Report number 3 49 pages, no price stated (Nairobi, UNEP, 1977) International Disaster Relief: Toward a Responsive System Stephen Green 101 pages, $3.95 1977)
(New York, McGraw-Hill,
Reconstruction Following Disaster edited by J. Eugene Haas, Robert W. Kates and Martyn J. Bowden 331 pages, ES.10 (Cambridge, Mass, and London, MIT Press, 1977) Perhaps one of the most vital problems which will concern mankind through the 1980s and beyond is the increasing scale of deaths and damage resulting from disasters, whether “natural” or Although statistically not “man-made”. conclusive, the signs from the patchy data available are not encouraging. Moreover, the greatest increase in losses appears to be in countries ill-equipped to withstand such shock-the Third world. l It seems appropriate therefore, while scientists are unable to control the natural environment on any scale or with any certainty, to concentrate efforts on the reduction of death and destruction, and on the curbing of vulnerability to extreme environmental events. These apparent trends in the magnitude of disaster losses have begun to be appreciated by academics, individuals, and organisations, in disaster-related K. N. Westgate is at the Project Planning Centre for developing countries, University of Bradford, UK.
FUTURES
April 1878
occupations. Suddenly, the breadth of the problem has promoted urgency: the result of this awakening has been a rapid proliferation of literature. Conflicting theories, approaches, and methodologies have emerged with lightning speed at a time when simple but effective action is required. The need for detailed and relevant study, however, is urgent. The disaster bandwagon may be regretted; yet, nevertheless, it may be a necessary evil, in order to allow dedicated scholars to come to grips with the reality. The problem is to sort the wheat from the chaff. Stephen Green’s essay is certainly a timely reminder that there is a need for speedy and effective solutions. Population increases and political pressures may lead to future disasters of cataclysmic proportions. The problem, for Green, is to be found in the management of individual many of which are not disasters, brought to the world’s attention until some considerable time after the emergency has occurred. This is particularly true of the more discrete, more pervasive type of disaster-as Green’s experiences as a UNICEF worker in the recent Ethiopian famine have indicated. 2 The international
responsibility
The reasons for this silence can often be found in the degree of instability within a national government and the fact that many of the international relief organisations, both private and public, are bound to secrecy-and to withhold assistance-until the national government states otherwise. Both relief itself, and the logistics of administration and
164
Books
distribution, must come under scrutiny, according to Green. There are, perhaps, too many organisations attempting to fill similar roles, while national governments often confuse the situation by overstating relief requirements, for political and commercial ends, by political or ethnic partiality in relief distribution, or because of corruption. For Green the prescription is clear: the international relief system must be reorganised immediately. The international coordination of disaster relief has long been an ideal of frustrated relief workers; Green’s appraisal of current and future relief potential obviously draws upon his own valuable field experiences. He visualises a stronger United Disaster Nations Relief Office (UNDRO) as the hub of this reorganisation, emphasising that whatever the national relief capabilities may be, there should be one and only one global focal point for international disaster relief-and that should be UNDRO in Geneva (page 48). A change of emphasis But is international disaster relief both creditable and necessary? This may not be the case. Any increase in the scale of international disaster operations, however well streamlined, can only add to the confusion and create greater opportunities for misappropriation and corruption within recipient countries. There is, indeed, reason enough for wanting to reduce international reliefmuch of it is irrelevant and superfluous, serving only to appease the Western conscience. If reorganisation means placing the emphasis on necessity, then reorganisation would be most welcome. But if it means putting all relief organisations under one umbrella, then the emphasis is wrong A decrease in the scale of operations, and a shift of the resources thus freed into development planning programmes which include comprehensive attention
to disaster vulnerability, is imperative. This principle is already accepted by UNDRO. 3 Green also suggests the establishment of a convention, similar to the Geneva Convention,
. . . through which signatory states would establish theprincifile of international responsibility for the relief of the human effects of major natural disasters. The convention would equate the denial or delay of relief to disaster victims with denial of the most basic of human rights-the right to life (pages 65-66). The convention would designate a body to implement this “principle of shared responsibility”, eg some neutral international organisation such as the Red Cross parent bodies-the League of Red Cross Societies and the International Conference of the Red Cross-who instigated the concept of shared responsibility for natural disasters after World War 1. Again the prescription is unrealistic. The past few years has seen the gradual erosion of whatever “power” the UN system may have had, and individual nation states can easily and effectively bypass the Geneva Convention, if they feel it is in their own interests to do so. Rampant nationalism among smaller countries is evident, and shows no sign of abating; the superpowers can only glower across conference tables. While Green’s sentiments may be laudable, they are also naive, and do not reflect the complex nature of international political bickering. The political motive for much relief aid is now well documented.4 With so many vested interests at stake it is difficult to conceive of a truly effective and responsible attitude to disasters in any
f orm. A parochial
approach
While Green’s emphasis is on international response during the emergency period, the volume Reconstruction Following Disaster extends the temporal interest to the periods of rebuilding and
FUTURES
April 1978
Books
rehabilitation. Based on four case studies, two current and two historical, the study examines chiefly the reestablishment of homes and jobs after disaster. The four case studies are the San Francisco earthquake of 1906, the Anchorage, Alaska, earthquake of 1964, the Rapid City, South Dakota, flash flood of 1972 and the Managua, Nicaragua, earthquake of the same year. The reasons for this study are clear: there is very little detailed examination of the reconstruction period following a major disaster. The volume, therefore, could fill an important gap in the research literature. Unfortunately, the editors chose otherwise. When the Managua earthquake occurred in December 1972, researchers
. . . were asked to carry out a preliminary assessment of the events in Nicaragua to see if some type of research there could provide findings of signiJicancefor United States cities in /zig/zseismic risk areas . . . [page xvii, my italics). The editors further
state that almost
. . . no research had been done on the problems, issues and alternative solutions during reconstruction following disasters, and there was none involving cross-cultural comparisons (page xvii, my italics). The emphasis is clear. The reason for cross-cultural comparison is to extract information relevant to US cities in high seismic risk areas. It has already been noted that much of the increase in disaster losses is shouldered by countries from the Third world. Yet literature from the USA remains parochial-and strong in the belief that whatever is relevant for the USA can be projected into other situations with comparative ease. This is a dangerous assumption. The problem for the US researcher is that very often his funding agency will not allow him to focus objectively upon the world. So Reconstruction Following Disaster fails where it could have succeeded. Had Managua not been included the
FUTURES
April lS78
165
study could have had credence. The study of Managua, however, is superficial and lacks an understanding of the that create underdevelopprocesses ment-processes which probably produced a greater disaster than would otherwise have occurred. Disaster
in context
The volume is specifically directed at the policy-maker and planner and attempts to answer specific questions: Should there be changes in land use ? Should the building codes be changed ? Should there be compensation for private property losses? How should family and personal problems be handled ? To answer some of these problems the authors use case study and scenario techniques. But such questions may never arise for a considerable proportion of the population in a city like Managua, where there was a shortfall of 80% on the housing stock before the and where rural-urban earthquake, migration produced squatter settlements of great squalor and poverty in and around the city. For these people, the disaster began before the earthquake. Many attempts have been made to join the disaster bandwagon-in the interests of high science, for humanitarian reasons, or in pursuit of sensationalism. Many attempts have failed because they do not understand the priorities, and do not comprehend the nature of the problems they intend to attack. Specifically, the mounting losses in the Third world cannot be met by resorting to the large and cumbersome international bodies so beloved of defenders of freedom. 6 The UN Environment Programme document Review of a Priority Subject Area: Natural Disasters underlines the weakness of such bodies. The document surveys current research activity and knowledge on the natural phenomena which cause disasters, and on measures for the mitigation of such disasters. The
166
Books
document is, however, not comprehensive, and its very brevity and simplicity often lends a certain banality to comments such as: When feasible, the restriction of human settlements to low risk areas offers enormous advantages (page 13).
Vulnerability:
the priority
Werner
1. See, for example,
2.
area
Similarly, the highly developed research tradition of the West (particularly the USA), based on premises developed from the study of its own disasters, has little meaning for the countries where the need is greatest. Disasters in the Third world will only be effectively tackled when their relationship with development policies and planning is appreciated, when disasters are no longer treated as isolated events but as part of one, dynamic environment, when promotion of self-reliance by individual countries is seen as the major focus of disaster mitigation, and when vulnerability is viewed as the priority area. All the international relief and aid in the world may still leave populations vulnerable: the reduction of that vulnerability is the key to reducing overall losses.6
Revealing
Notes and references
the irrational
3.
4.
5.
6.
A. Baird, P. O’Keefe, K. Westgate, and B. Wisner, Towards an and Reduction of Disaster Explanation Proneness, Disaster Research Unit Occasional Paper 11, University of Bradford, UK, 1975. An excellent case study of the Ethiopian famine, with an afterword by Stephen Green, is Jack Shepherd’s T’ Politics of Starvation (Washington DC, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 1975). The UNDRO view is expressed by Faruk Berkol, Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations Disaster Relief disasters: a Coordinator in “Natural neglected variable in national development strategies”, International Social Science Journal, 28 (4), pages 730-735. See the discussion of these international relief aspects by Laurie Wiseberg, “An international perspective on the African famines”, in M. H. Glantz ed, The Politics of .Natural Disaster: the Case of the Sahel Drought (New York, Praeger, 1976), pages 101-127. See Lord Chalfont, “The UN could build success out of disaster”, The Times, 6 December 1976. long-term preventive The case for planning is given in P. O’Keefe and “Preventive planning for K. Westgate, Long-Range Planning, June disasters”, 1977,10, pages 25-29.
man
Hirsch
The JoyZess Economy Tibor Scitovsky 310 pages, El.95 (London, versity Press, 1976)
Oxford
Uni-
It came as a great shock in 1965 when students rioted at the University of California at Berkeley. It was the beginning of a wave of student unrest The author is Professor of Economics at the University of California, Los Angeles, California 90024, USA.
which rapidly spread to Columbia, Harvard, Yale, and others, finally spilling over into Germany, Japan, France, and the UK. During those hectic days, Tibor Scitovsky was teaching economics at Berkeley, and it must have been ironic and puzzling to him that most of the student leaders were from middle- and upper-middle-class backgrounds. Why would young men and born into affluence, be so women,
FUTURES
April 1978