David AlexanderUniversity College London

Perspectives on Higher Educationin Risk and Disaster Reduction

The long, arduous searchfor a core curriculum

Humanmisery

●poverty●disease●malnutrition●conflict●displacement●disasters

... and climate change...?

A Century of"Disasterology"

1917-2015

The 'Big Bang'Halifax, Nova Scotiaship explosion,1917

2,000 dead, 9,000 injured

Rev. DrSamuel Henry Prince

1885-1960Nova Scotia,

Columbia University

ProfessorHarlan H. Barrows

1877-1960Michigan,

Chicago University

1920

1923

Floods,1920s-1960s

Gilbert Fowler White 1911-2006

Herbert Simon:'optimisers' and 'satisficers'

"Human beings, viewed as behaving systems,are quite simple. The apparent complexityof our behaviour over time is largely areflection of the complexity of theenvironment in which we find ourselves."

"The social sciences, I thought, needed thesame kind of rigour and the same mathe-matical underpinnings that had made the'hard' sciences so brilliantly successful."

1970s-1980sDrought,storms,earthquakes,tornadoes,volcanic eruptions

The age of "rationalist human ecology"

Hewitt, K. (ed.) 1983. Interpretations of Calamityfrom the Viewpoint of Human Ecology. Unwin-Hyman, London:304 pp.

The 'radical critique'

HUMANCONSEQUENCES

OF DISASTER

“ORTHODOX” MODEL

PHYSICALEVENT

HUMANVULNERABILITY

“RADICAL CRITIQUE” (K. HEWITT et al.)HUMAN

CONSEQUENCESOF DISASTER

HUMANVULNERABILITY

PHYSICALEVENT

Civil contingencies

Resilience

management

The risk environment

Businesscontinuity

Civildefence

Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR)

Civilprotection

HumanitarianRelief

• what does 'neutrality' mean?

• does humanitarian aid cause disaster?

• aid is a global industry – big business

• why is the system so inefficient?

• to big to stop, too diverse to fix.

Dilemmas of humanitarianism 1992-2015

War andconflict

Pove

rty

Naturaldisasters

Inse

curity

Vulnerability andmarginalisation

Military

Humanitarian assistance

assistance

The "Military Cross"

Justice Impartiality

Humanitarianism

Hijacking ofassistance

Relief

Robberyand rapeof victims

Totalwar

Politicisation ofrelief suppies

Whatfuture?

The second'big bang':9-11 and

the "War onTerrorism"

Armed aggressionon the part of states

Civil defence

Natural disasters

Civil protection

Armed aggressionon the part of

groups of dissidents

"Homeland security"(civil defence)

"Generic" disasters

"Civil contingencies"(resilience)

• concept of 'war' was misleading

• it spread radicalisation

• neglect of natural disaster preparedness

• unhealthy regeneration of Cold War

• USA lost lead role in 'disasterology'.

What went wrong

The entry onto the stage of resilience1981-2015

General resilience

Disaster resilience Disaster mitigation

Disaster response

The broader picture

Prof. CrawfordStanley ('Buzz')

Holling[b. 1930],Canadiansystemsecologist,Universityof Florida

Annual Review of Ecology & Systematics 4 (1973)

LAW

STATESMANSHIP

LITERATURE

SCIENTIFICMETHOD

MECHANICS

MANU-FACTURING

ECOLOGY

MANAGEMENT(ADAPTIVE)

CHILDPSYCHOLOGY

ANTHROPOLOGY

SOCIALRESEARCH

DISASTER RISKREDUCTION

SUSTAINABILITYSCIENCE CLIMATE CHANGE

ADAPTATION

c. BC 50

AD 15291625

1859

19301950

1973

2000

2010

NATURALHISTORY

• analysis of the stabilityof ecological assemblages

• ideal for island ecology andother well-defined systems

• in line with GST resilienceis an equilibrium tendency

• promotes a narrow viewof the resilience concept

• Holling's approach has beenwidely used uncritically.

Holling's use of the resilience concept

RESILIENCE

Social

Tech

nica

l

Physical

Psych

ological

CLIMATE CHANGEADAPTATION

DISASTER RISKREDUCTION

OTHER HAZARDSAND RISKS

naturalsocial

technologicalintentionalcompoundcascading

SUSTAINABILITYSCIENCE

• an objective, a process or a strategy?

• a paradigm, diverse paradigms?

• 'bounce-back' or 'bounce-forward'?

• focuses on the community scale

• can reconcile dynamic & static elements.

Resilience

RESILIENCE:as a material has brittlestrength and ductility:

society must have an optimumcombination of resistance tohazard impacts and ability

to adapt to them.

HUMANCONSEQUENCES

OF DISASTER

“ORTHODOX” MODEL

PHYSICALEVENT

HUMANVULNERABILITY

“RADICAL CRITIQUE” (K. HEWITT et al.)HUMAN

CONSEQUENCESOF DISASTER

HUMANVULNERABILITY

PHYSICALEVENT

CURRENT NEEDS

HUMANCONSEQUENCES

OF DISASTER

HUMANVULNERABILITY

CULTURE HISTORYPHYSICALEVENTS

CONTEXT & CONSEQUENCES

Resilientculture

Culture ofresilience

A model of culture

Organisationalsystems:management

Socialsystems:behaviour

Naturalsystems:function

Technicalsystems:

malfunction

VulnerabilityHazard

Resilienc

e

Politicalsystems:decisions

Long term

Short term

Emic components

Etic components

METAMORPHOSISOF CULTURE

Experiences of culture[mass-media and consumer culture]

Accumulated cultural traits and beliefs

Inherited cultural background

Ideological(non-scientific)interpretations

of disaster

Learned(scientific)

interpretationsof disaster

Retribution Judgement Portent

DISASTERMEANING ACCEPTANCE

Retrospectiveinterpretation

Predictiveinterpretation

Traditional view of disaster - modern parallels?

Symbolisminherent in

technologicalculture

Traditionalsymbolism

and portent

Event

Interpretation

Dynamic culturalmetamorphosis

Valuesystem

Familyculture

Workculture

Peergroupculture

Personalculture

National culture

Regional culture

Riskamplification

factors

Riskmitigationfactors

Totalvulnerability

Risk perceptionfactors- +

positivenegative

DIALECTIC

INSTRUMENTS OFDISSEMINATION

• mass media• targeted campaign• social networks

• internet

Augmentation

MASSEDUCATIONPROGRAMME

HUMANCAPITAL

HABIT

CULTURE

The creation of a culture of civil protection

What next?

This is the world we live in.

The wreck of rational analysis uponthe rock of political considerations.

Evidence can be:-• precise• decisive• equivocal• ambiguous• puzzling• uninterpretable

(evidence of what?)• ignored• distorted• used selectively.

Displacementand migration

Climate changeadaptation

Disaster responseand mitigation

Climate change Terrorism

Displacementand migration

Pandemicsand epidemics

Population increase

Env

iron

ment

al ch

ang

eConflict

Technologicaldisasters and

major incidents

'Natural'disasters

RISKSdaily: unemployment, poverty, disease, etc.major disaster: floods, storms, quakes, etc.emerging risks: pandemics, climate change

SUSTAINABILITYdisaster risk reduction

resource consumptionstewardship of the environment

economic activitieslifestyles and communities

SUSTAINABILITY

Vulnerability

Total: life isgenerally precariousEconomic: people lackadequate occupationTechnological/technocratic: dueto the riskiness of technologyDelinquent: caused bycorruption, negligence, etc.Residual: caused bylack of modernisationNewly generated: caused bychanges in circumstances

• disaster risk reduction and climatechange adaptation will partially merge

• global mobility will become a majorfactor in disaster risk reduction

• resilience will probably disappoint

• the weight of key concepts: vulnerability

• sustainable DRR, sustainable lives.

The future

System is... Example of catalytic disaster

SubstitutedEconomic catastrophe after

mega natural or anthropogenic event

Threshold of economic sustainability

Redirected Indian Ocean tsunami, 2004 (?)

Threshold of political and public tolerance

Static Earthquakes: Sichuan 2008, Nepal 2015

Threshold of sustained political and public attention

In decline No significant major events

The potential catalysts for change

Conclusions

Basic concepts:hazard, vulnerability,

exposure, risk,impact, resilience, etc.

Hazardanalysis

Technical skills:telecomminications

computer, GIS, etc.Emergencyplanning

Emergencymanagement

Disastersociology andpsychology

Public informationmanagement

Recovery andreconstruction

planning

Methods ofrisk mitigation

Fieldexercises

Disaster and emergencymanagement training

Broad professional training in emergency management

Professional experienceand training

Disciplinary training(e.g. bachelor's degree)

Commonculture

Commonlanguage

Commonobjectives

Regulationof hazardousindustries(Séveso)

Consultancyservices

Businesscontinuity

management

Insurance:prediction

and actuarialwork

Emergencyplanning andmanagement

Humanitarianrelief and

development

Education andtraining in crisisand emergencymanagement

On-the-jobcivil protection

experience

Management,social science

and hazards studies

Recognition andan institutionalrole for the

professional figure

Certificationof competence

Trainingprogrammes

Emergingprofessional

figure

Policies andlegislation

Research Experience

Organi-sation

Academicknowledgeproducer

Simple phenomenon

Complex analysis

Beneficiary(knowledgeuser)

barrier oftechnicalcomplexity

Unsatisfactoryoutcome

Write strongly.

Write simply.

Avoid jargon.

Reduce technical complexity.

Write to communicate.

david.alexander@ucl.ac.ukwww.slideshare.net/dealexanderemergency-planning.blogspot.com