Vulnerability paradox

In some disaster recovery research I've been reading recently, Rodney Runyan, in his article Small Business in the Face of Crisis, notes:

" With the technological advances societies have seen over the past century, we often feel that disasters can be safely predicted or controlled. But the paradox is that the safer our world becomes, the more vulnerable we are when a disaster actually happens."

This strikes true for New Orleans. The levee system reduced seasonal flooding and loss from storm surge during smaller hurricanes. However, when Katrina did hit, the loss was catastrophic. Much of the housing was built with little or no thought to flooding and was quickly destroyed by the water. Residential and commercial construction expanded into previous swamp land that had been uninhabitable before the levees. The Corps and FEMA furthered an unwarranted sense of safety by basing flood maps on rainfall and drainage, rather than on levee breach scenarios.

It seems obvious that people who regularly experience the inconveniences and losses from hurricanes, earthquakes, floods are more used to the experience. They may also have less to loose because they do not accumulate what can be easily destroyed by such events.

With technological strategies for disaster reduction in place, it is definitely more of an affront to our sense of safety when a unexpectedly large hazard does occur. We are less physically prepared when we don't regularly experience disasters. Nor are we able to as easily pass down disaster resilience knowledge or a sense of continued watchfulness from one generation to the next when the period between disasters is long.

But, on the other hand, technology has also done much to reduce losses (especially loss of life) from disasters....even if it also creates a false sense of complete safety. I certainly want the best in building codes, early warning systems, urban planning ... and yes, the occasional levee, even if I know that are only technological tools for disaster reduction, not the complete solution.

Perhaps it isn't that we are better or worse off with newer technologies, but that the pattern of losses, vulnerabilities and capacities shift. It is these shifts that we need to really pay attention to. Following a comment below by HonSanto, its not that we are overdeveloped, but that we may be dysfunctionally developed. It's an interesting paradox to ponder. Thoughts?

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Who has it worse?

I found myself having an interesting conversation last night with a person, whom I will call Sally. We began discussing the record breaking flooding here in Washington State, flooding that severely impacted local farms and dairies in the Chehalis river valley. Several farms have lost almost all of their herds and now are owners of flood-soaked homes, destroyed equipment, and fields covered with a thick layer of rapidly hardening sludge.

I remarked that the destruction was very much like New Orleans, albeit on a much smaller and more dispersed scale. Sally countered that this event was so much worse for the farmers because they had something to lose, they actually had livelihoods. And, she added, it was worse because it was the middle of winter and so miserable to be without a home now.

The remark momentarily threw me off guard, but did not really surprise me. Sally vocalized an implicit empathy for people with whom she felt more of a commonality and which she was geographically closer. This can positive thing. Local communities are often in the best position to help survivors in the immediate aftermath of a disaster. A strong sense of empathy with ones neighbors, at the local and regional scale, has certainly contributed to the strong outpouring of supplies, offers of housing, and voluntary clean-up crews that have developed during and immediately after the Chehalis flooding. Locals and people with which one has a commonality may also give the most appropriate aid.

However, implicit in Sally's remarks was also the vocalization of stereotypes many have come to believe about New Orleanians. There is an implicit racism, an "othering" of Katrina survivors, that has shaped response.

The depth of this differentiated understanding of pain and loss is disturbing to say the least, and has resulted in significantly delayed recovery for low-income African-Americans in New Orleans' Lower Ninth Ward. You can read more that in an article I wrote for the December issue of Disasters and in an editorial posted here.

What struck me most about Sally's remark was, firstly, the disturbing comparison of loss of cattle herds to the excruciating losses of over 1000 human beings. There is also unwarranted assumption that New Orleanians "didn't have anything to lose." The hardest hit Lower Ninth Ward was a neighborhood with high African-American homeowners (much higher than national averages) and many established small businesses. Residents had much to lose, including mortgage free homes and close-knit family networks of support. And even beyond the wrong assumption that "those" people in New Orleans were too poor and unemployed and marginalized to really lose anything valuable, is that really the criteria for empathy? Research has show that it is the poor that have the hardest time recovering to pre-disaster levels. When you have much to lose, you also have many resources by which to regain your losses. The whole conversation rather rattled me.

Its so easy to distance ones self from the experiences of people who do not look or act like us or may be in some distant place....whether that be on the other side of the world, the country or the proverbial train tracks.

I don't think its even logical to compare the destruction along the Gulf Coast and the drowning of New Orleans with flooding here in Washington State. The destruction of cattle herds and the destruction of the entire economy of a city are very different and the recovery trajectory will show this. But, on the other hand, at the individual scale, physical loss, depression and the economic struggle that set in after a disaster are very similar for the families and individuals that experience them. I wouldn't want to be in any of their shoes.

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Triumph in Bangladesh

News of Cyclone Sidr is slowly spreading beyond Bangladesh. This powerful cyclone swept across the low-lying country on Thursday and Friday. While the cyclone was a category 4, more powerful in some measurements to Hurricane Katrina, the current death tolls in slightly over 3000 and it looks like they may ultimately remain below 10,000.

So why is this a triumph? Certainly casualties from predictable natural hazards, especially ones that allow for some early warning, are not something to celebrate. However, this current death toll is utterly dwarfed by a similar cyclone 16 years ago. In 1991 a cyclone caused 140,000 deaths. Since then, aid organizations and national disaster risk reduction efforts have worked tirelessly to build early warning systems, elevated evacuation shelters and to educate people on how to respond before during and after such an event. Bangledesh's efforts in this regard clearly show the effectiveness of these efforts. The fact that they achieved such a large reduction of casualties in the context of a populous, developing nation certainly sets a high bar for all of us.

Bangladesh Toll at More Than 3,000, New York Times article.

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Vulnerability and gender

A colleague asked me to recently review a disaster plan checklist. One of the checklist items was ensuring that the needs of "disabled family members, the elderly, small children and women" be taken into account as needed.

I understand the sentiment, and think it is important to highlight how vulnerability, capacity and disaster experience may change across social groups. For women who are in communities that are ignoring their experience, obviously its critical that they become equal partners in disaster risk reduction. In Bangledesh floods, women have died because they were at home during a flash flood and lacked a familial male escort to evacuate to a safer location. During Hurricane Katrina, the elderly died in higher percentages. Many could not evacuate due to medical conditions; others died due to the tremendous stress all survivors faced. Following the Northridge earthquake, emergency shelters were provided for single men and families. Single women were not initially considered as a group needing their own shelters. Social vulnerability must be carefully considered in disaster risk reduction, emergency response and recovery planning.

Yet, I also cringed when I read "women." This is a category that I would be placed in but it feels very strange
to be put in a list of vulnerable people, especially a category so large as "women." I have no desire to be viewed as someone within a vulnerable group who needs pity. The list of "disabled family members, elderly, small children, and women" gives the unintended impression that all these "poor" and "weaker" members of society need special protection and help because they are powerless to help themselves.

Sometimes these groups are more vulnerable, but there are also a lot of cases where these groups may be better equipped to deal with or reduce disaster threats. Sometimes it is the physically-capable, male who is most at risk from a hazard, due to cultural gender norms that lead them to not ask for help or to engage in dangerous emergency response activities. Other times, it may be men who are most exposed to a hazards.

In the long run, it behooves us to remember that those most at risk may not appreciate being labeled as "vulnerable." It may make more sense to speak to people about their vulnerabilities and capacities or to focus on particular activities or aspects that make a group more vulnerable, allowing for variation among that group. In the short term, perhaps including "men" as a category of people who may have special needs, vulnerabilities and capacities would make the point about gendered vulnerability more broadly and do so without the implicit stigmatization. Doing so means we should include the needs of the "elderly, disabled, children, women and men" wherever appropriate.

For those interested in disasters and gender, there is the Gender and Disaster Network (GDN).


Addendum: After writing this, I saw Maureen Fordham's invited comments on Social Vulnerability and Capacity in the Natural Hazards Observer, November 2007.

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When cultural assumptions meet with disaster

Our culture and past experience profoundly shape how each of us experiences a disaster. Yesterday Mark Howard, the Strategic Advisor to the Seattle Office of Emergency Management, spoke of one such example here at Western Washington University, Bellingham, WA when he described how people died in the Hanukkah Eve Wind Storm of 2006.

The unusually heavy rain and wind of the storm felled power poles and trees throughout the Puget Sound Region. Over 1.8 million residents and businesses lost power, some for longer than a week. When power had still not returned days later, residents began using gas-powered generators to light their homes, prepare food and provide desperately needed heat. Despite heavily advertised warnings not to bring these generators into enclosed areas, some residents did so anyway.

The rash of carbon monoxide deaths and illnesses that followed was concentrated in the region’s immigrant communities. In these communities, cultural assumptions and new hazards met in a deadly mix. Immigrants from Africa, Latin American and Southeast Asia came from regions where families often used in-door fires, stoves and generators. Yet, in these regions, homes were built to allow air to flow through open windows and heat to escape. Gases emitted by indoor stoves or grill, while having serious long-term health effects, did not build up in concentration and bring the threat of immediate death. Here in the cold and damp Puget Sound Region, homes are well-sealed. They are designed to retain heat, but are also efficient at retaining carbon monoxide when gas generators or cars are operated indoors.

In the long days with out power that followed the Storm, the Seattle Times posted a front page, multi-language public safety warning. The local Red Cross placed safety tips on their website. Leaflets were posted throughout neighborhoods with high immigrant populations; multi-language public service messages were read over local radio stations.

While the public education was prominent and swift, it was not enough. Eight people died from carbon monoxide poisoning, five from a single Vietnamese family. Over 60 more people had to be treated for severe carbon-monoxide poisoning. Most were Somali immigrants who had brought their charcoal grills inside.

Disaster risk reduction and emergency planning comes with its own cultural assumptions about how and when to help people. In the wake of this event, emergency managers like Mark Howard are considering their own assumptions. What is the best way to inform immigrant communities about hazards? What channels will they trust? What more might they need to know compared to other parts of our community? Where will they seek help?

As a profession we must become more adept at understanding all our diverse communities and including them in emergency planning and preparedness. In doing so, we can help them adjust not only to new opportunities in our cities, but to new hazards.

Additional interesting readings on the interplay of culture in the preparation for, experience of and recovery from disasters.

Douglas, M. and A. Wildavsky (1983). Risk and Culture. Berkeley, University of California Press.

Green, R. A. (2005). Negotiating Risk: Earthquakes, Structural Vulnerability and Clientelism in Istanbul. Civil and Environmental Engineering. Ithaca, Cornell University.

Green, R. A. (2008). "Unauthorized Development and Natural Hazard Vulnerability: A Study of Squatters and Engineers in Istanbul, Turkey." Disasters (forthcoming).


Hoffman, S. and A. Oliver-Smith, Eds. (2001). Catastrophe and Culture. Santa Fe and Oxford, School of American Research Press and James Currey.

Oliver-Smith, A. (1986). The Martyred City: Death and Rebirth in the Andes. Albuquerque, New Mexico, University of New Mexico Press.

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Privatizing emergency response

Here is a thought provoking article in The Nation on the privatization of emergency response in recent disasters. What are the implications of a society where privatized response dominates?

Rapture Rescue 911: Disaster Response for the Chosen
The Nation, post on-line November 1, 2007, in print November 19, 2007
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20071119/klein
By Naomi Klein


I used to worry that the United States was in the grip of extremists who sincerely believed that the Apocalypse was coming and that they and their friends would be airlifted to heavenly safety. I have since reconsidered. The country is indeed in the grip of extremists who are determined to act out the biblical climax--the saving of the chosen and the burning of the masses--but without any divine intervention. Heaven can wait. Thanks to the booming business of privatized disaster services, we're getting the Rapture right here on earth.

Just look at what is happening in Southern California. Even as wildfires devoured whole swaths of the region, some homes in the heart of the inferno were left intact, as if saved by a higher power. But it wasn't the hand of God; in several cases it was the handiwork of Firebreak Spray Systems. Firebreak is a special service offered to customers of insurance giant American International Group (AIG)--but only if they happen to live in the wealthiest ZIP codes in the country. Members of the company's Private Client Group pay an average of $19,000 to have their homes sprayed with fire retardant. During the wildfires, the "mobile units"--racing around in red firetrucks--even extinguished fires for their clients.

One customer described a scene of modern-day Revelation. "Just picture it. Here you are in that raging wildfire. Smoke everywhere. Flames everywhere. Plumes of smoke coming up over the hills," he told the Los Angeles Times. "Here's a couple guys showing up in what looks like a firetruck who are experts trained in fighting wildfire and they're there specifically to protect your home."

And your home alone. "There were a few instances," one of the private firefighters told Bloomberg News, "where we were spraying and the neighbor's house went up like a candle." With public fire departments cut to the bone, gone are the days of Rapid Response, when everyone was entitled to equal protection. Now, increasingly intense natural disasters will be met with the new model: Rapture Response.

During last year's hurricane season, Florida homeowners were offered similarly high-priced salvation by HelpJet, a travel agency launched with promises to turn "a hurricane evacuation into a jet-setter vacation." For an annual fee, a company concierge takes care of everything: transport to the air terminal, luxurious travel, bookings at five-star resorts. Most of all, HelpJet is an escape hatch from the kind of government failure on display during Katrina. "No standing in lines, no hassle with crowds, just a first class experience."

HelpJet is about to get some serious competition from some much larger players. In northern Michigan, during the same week that the California fires raged, the rural community of Pellston was in the grip of an intense public debate. The village is about to become the headquarters for the first fully privatized national disaster response center. The plan is the brainchild of Sovereign Deed, a little-known start-up with links to the mercenary firm Triple Canopy. Like HelpJet, Sovereign Deed works on a "country-club type membership fee," according to the company's vice president, retired Brig. Gen. Richard Mills. In exchange for a one-time fee of $50,000 followed by annual dues of $15,000, members receive "comprehensive catastrophe response services" should their city be hit by a manmade disaster that can "cause severe threats to public health and/or well-being" (read: a terrorist attack), a disease outbreak or a natural disaster. Basic membership includes access to medicine, water and food, while those who pay for "premium tiered services" will be eligible for VIP rescue missions.

Like so many private disaster companies, Sovereign Deed is selling escape from climate change and the failed state--by touting the security clearance and connections its executives amassed while working for that same state. So Mills, speaking recently in Pellston, explained, "The reality of FEMA is that it has no infrastructure, and a lot of our National Guard is elsewhere." Sovereign Deed, on the other hand, claims to have "direct access and special arrangements with several national and international information centers. These proprietary arrangements allow our Emergency Operations Center to...give our Members that critical head start in times of crisis." In this secular version of the Rapture, God's hand is unnecessary. Not when you have retired ex-CIA agents and ex-Special Forces lifting the chosen to safety--no need to pray, just pay. And who needs a celestial New Jerusalem when you can have Pellston, with its flexible local politicians and its surprisingly modern regional airport?

Sovereign Deed could soon find itself competing with Blackwater USA, whose CEO, Erik Prince, wrote recently of his plans to offer "full spectrum" services, including humanitarian aid in disasters. When fires broke out in San Diego County, near the proposed site of the controversial Blackwater West base, the company immediately seized the opportunity to make its case. Blackwater could have been the "tactical operation center for East County fires," said company vice president Brian Bonfiglio. "Can you imagine how much of a benefit it would be if we were operational now?" To show off its capacity, Blackwater has been distributing badly needed food and blankets to people of Potrero, California. "This is something we've always done," Bonfiglio said. "This is what we do." Actually, what Blackwater does, as Iraqis have painfully learned, is not protect entire communities or countries but "protect the principal"--the principal being whoever has paid Blackwater for its guns and gear.
The same pay-to-be-saved logic governs this entire new sector of country club disaster management. There is, of course, another principle that could guide our collective responses in a disaster-prone world: the simple conviction that every life is of equal value.

For anyone out there who still believes in that wild idea, the time has urgently arrived to protect the principle.

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