Book Reviews

Book reviewed:
Annelies Heijmans and Lorna P. Victoria, Citizenry–based and Development–oriented Disaster Response: Experiences and Practices in Disaster Management of the Citizens' Disaster Response Network in the Philippines     

Book Reviews

Books Reviewed:
Simon Fisher, Dekha Ibrahim Abdi, Jawed Ludin, Richard Smith, Steve Williams and Sue Williams Working with Conflict: Skills and Strategies for Action
Annelies Heijmans and Lorna P. Victoria, Citizenry-based and Development-oriented Disaster Response: Experiences and Practices in Disaster Management of the Citizens' Disaster Response Network in the Philippines
Tony Vaux, The Selfish Altruist. Relief Work in Famine and War     

BOOK REVIEWS

Book reviewed in this article:
Disaster Mitigation: A Community Based Approach , by Andrew Maskrey. Oxfam
The Threatening Desert: Controlling Desertification , by Alan Grainger
Rising from the Ashes: Development Strategies in Times of Disaster , by Mary B. Anderson and Peter J. Woodrow
Disaster Management for Libraries: Planning and Process , by Claire England and Karen Evans
Rural Communities Under Stress: Peasant Farmers and the State in Africa , by Jonathan Barker
Bangladesh: the Strength to Succeed , by Jim Monan     

支持灾害管理决策的咨询信息系统

为减少中国大城市灾害造成的损失，运用信息科学、系统科学的方法和计算机技术，建立支持灾害管理决策的咨询信息系统（ＤＭＤＳＣＩＳ）。灾害文献数据库管理系统（ＤＬＤＢＭＳ）是这一咨询信息系统的知识基础和信息来源。本文论述了“ＤＬＤＢＭＳ”和三个主要的子系统“灾害文献数据库管理系统”、“灾害事实数据库管理系统”、“中外减灾法规超文本检索系统”的作用、设计思想、构成、功能和实现方法。     

基于知识图谱可视化视角的旅游灾害管理研究综述

如何进行旅游灾害管理是全球旅游目的地共同关注的问题.首先界定了旅游灾害管理的概念,然后在中国知网和Web of Science中分别筛选了168篇和180篇中英文文献,采用知识图谱文献可视化分析方法,绘制了发文量、作者和发文机构,以及关键词共现图谱.研究认为,国内外旅游灾害管理研究集中于旅游灾害风险、旅游风险评估、灾害...     

Conferences

Second Caribbean Conference on Science, Hazards and Hazard Management; Kingston, Jamaica, 9-12 October 1996
Mitigating the Millennium: Seminar on Community Participation and Impact Measurement in Disaster Preparedness and Mitigation Programmes; Overseas Development Institute, London, 9 October 1996     

A critical analysis of the South African Disaster Management Act and Policy Framework

The promulgation of the South African Disaster Management Act No. 57 of 2002 and the National Disaster Management Policy Framework of 2005 placed South Africa at the international forefront by integrating disaster risk reduction into all spheres of government through a decentralised approach. Yet, good policy and legislation do not necessarily translate into good practice. This paper provides a critical analysis of the Act and Policy Framework. Using qualitative research methods, it analyses the attitudes and perceptions of senior public officials on all levels of government, the private sector and academia. The study finds that one of the weakest aspects of the Act and Framework is the absence of clear guidance to local municipalities. The placement of the disaster risk management function on all tiers of government remains problematic, funding is inadequate and overall knowledge and capacities for disaster risk reduction are insufficient.     

Revealing the socioeconomic impact of small disasters in Colombia using the DesInventar database

Small disasters are usually the product of climate variability and climate change. Analysis of them illustrates that they increase difficulties for local development—frequently affecting the livelihoods of poor people and perpetuating their level of poverty and human insecurity—and entail challenges for a country's development. In contrast to extreme events, small disasters are often invisible at the national level and their effects are not considered as relevant from a macroeconomic standpoint. Nevertheless, their accumulated impact causes economic, environmental and social problems. This paper presents the results of an evaluation of the DesInventar database, developed in 1994 by the Network for Social Studies in Disaster Prevention in Latin America. In addition, it proposes a new version of the Local Disaster Index developed in 2005 within the framework of the Disaster Risk and Management Indicators Program for the Americas, with the support of the Inter‐American Development Bank.     

Mass casualty incident after the Taba terrorist attack: an organisational and medical challenge

Two suicide bombings in and around Taba, Egypt, on 7 October 2004 created a complex medical and organisational situation. Since most victims were Israeli tourists, the National Emergency and Disaster Management Division handled their evacuation and treatment. This paper describes the event chronologically, as well as the organisational and management challenges confronted and applied solutions. Forty-nine emergency personnel and physicians were flown early to the disaster area to reinforce scarce local medical resources. Two hundred casualties were recorded: 32 dead and 168 injured. Eilat hospital was transformed into a triage facility. Thirty-two seriously injured patients were flown to two remote trauma centres in central Israel. Management of mass casualty incidents is difficult when local resources are inadequate. An effective response should include: rapid transportation of experienced trauma teams to the disaster zone; conversion of local medical amenities into a triage centre; and rapid evacuation of the seriously injured to higher level medical facilities.     

论城市灾害管理模型

城市是人类抗灾,防灾的重点,加强城市灾害防治是城市,乃至整个国家可持续发展的必要保证,城市灾害管理是减轻城市灾害的主要的主要措施之一,本文用管理学,控制论,决策论的思想建立了城市灾害管理的模型。     

加强综合灾害风险研究,提高迎对灾害风险能力——从第6届国际综合灾害风险管理论坛看我国的综合减灾

综述了第6届国际IIASA-DPRI综合灾害风险管理论坛的主要内容，并就中国综合灾害风险管理对策提出了具体的建议。本届论坛的主题是：风险与商业和产经界面临的挑战。论坛除主题报告外，共设置了16个分会场，就综合灾害风险信息共享平台（DRH）的建设、产经界如何迎对灾害风险、地震与洪水灾害风险的综合管理、灾害风险教育与减灾意识的养成、综合灾害风险管理的理论与方法论探讨，以及土耳其国家综合灾害风险管理的经验与教训等进行了深人的研讨。针对上述进展，从我国减灾工作现状，提出从三个方面加强我国综合减灾与灾害风险管理工作，即：各级政府在加强应急管理工作的同时，要高度重视从综合的角度完善减灾战略、规划和能力建设；全面改进产经界迎对灾害风险的能力，特别是非国有中小企业防御灾害风险的能力，以及大型国有企业灾害自保或参保机制的完善；加强综合灾害风险管理研究。     

BOOK REVIEWS

Book reviewed in this article:
Epidemiology of Natural Disasters by John Seaman et al.
Insurance and Natural Disaster Management, James Cook University, 20th to 22nd July 1983 Collected Seminar Papers edited by John Oliver.
A Bridge of People: A Personal View of Oxfam's First Forty Years by Ben Whitaker, Heinemann.
Volcanoes of the World. A Regional Directory, Gazeteer and Chronology of Volcanism During the Last 10,000 Years by T. Simkin et al.
Home Mortgage Lenders, Real Property Appraisers and Earthquake Hazards by Risa I. Palm et al.
Krakatau 1883: The Volcanic Eruption and its Effects by Tom Simkin and Richard S. Fiske.     

解放以来我国农业灾害综述

本文根据现有数据，浅析了解放以来我国农业灾害，特别是水、旱灾害的变化及其原因；分析了成灾比例与减灾工作状况之间存在着内在的联系，指出成灾比例可以在一定程度上反映减灾工作的好坏。旨在为客观评价我国农业减灾现状，合理配置减灾力量，提供信息和决策依据。     

Book Reviews

Yasemin Aysan, Andrew Clayton, Alistair Cory, Ian Davis and David Sanderson. Developing Building for Safety Programmes: Guidelines for Organizing Safe Building Improvement Programmes in Disaster-prone Areas
Y. Danieli, N.S. Rodley and L. Weisaeth. . International Responses to Traumatic Stress. Humanitarian, Human Rights, Justice, Peace and Development Contributions, Collaborative Actions and Future Initiatives
Sharon Hutchinson. Nuer Dilemmas: Coping with Money, War and the State
Michael Edwards and David Hulme. Non-Governmental Organisations Performance and Accountability: Beyond the Magic Bullet
Thomas E. Drabek. Disaster Evacuation Behavior: Tourists and Other Transients.
Jeremy Armon and Andy Carl. Accord–An International Review of Peace Initiatives: The Liberian Peace Process, 1990–1996
Peter J. May. Environmental Management and Governance: Intergovernmental Approaches to Hazards and Sustainability     

How Is Household Vulnerability Gendered? Female‐headed Households in the Collectives of Suleimaniyah,Iraqi Kurdistan

This research tries to reach an understanding of the well-being of female-headed household members through a comparison to male-headed household members in the collectives of the Suleimaniyah governorate in Iraqi Kurdistan. Research was undertaken in five collectives in Suleimaniyah during the summer of 1998. The research contributes to the current gender and development debates which are concerned with improving the understanding of the specific gendered forms of disadvantage faced by female-headed households rather than assuming the universal poverty of this group. An understanding of well-being is approached through a broad conceptualisation of vulnerability in preference to a narrow poverty definition. That the findings of this research are complex attests to the multi-dimensional and mutually constitutive gendered experiences of vulnerability. The definitive conclusion to emerge from this research is a refuting of the rhetoric-fuelled stereotype that households headed by women are at a disadvantage in all the dimensions of vulnerability in comparison to households headed by men. The research also establishes the methodological necessity of examining intra-household distributive mechanisms that determine individuals' well-being.     

Conceptualising disaster social capital: what it is,why it matters,and how it can be enhanced

Social capital discourse occupies an important place in disaster studies. Scholars have adopted various inflections of social capital to explain how those with greater amounts of this crucial resource are generally more resilient to disasters and experience speedier recovery. Disaster scholars have also discovered that people typically display altruistic tendencies in the wake of disasters and develop novel networks of mutual support, known as ‘communitas’, which is also seen to build resilience and boost recovery. In this paper, we use the work of Pierre Bourdieu to synthesise these literatures, conceptualising communitas as ‘disaster social capital’. We offer a fleshed-out definition of disaster social capital to distinguish it from regular social capital and discuss the barriers to, and the enablers of, its formation. While primarily a conceptual discussion, we believe that it has practical and policy value for disaster scholars and practitioners interested in inclusive disaster risk reduction as well as full and just recoveries.     

A cluster-based decision support system for estimating earthquake damage and casualties

This paper describes a Decision Support System for Disaster Management (DSS-DM) to aid operational and strategic planning and policy-making for disaster mitigation and preparedness in a less-developed infrastructural context. Such contexts require a more flexible and robust system for fast prediction of damage and losses. The proposed system is specifically designed for earthquake scenarios, estimating the extent of human losses and injuries, as well as the need for temporary shelters. The DSS-DM uses a scenario approach to calculate the aforementioned parameters at the district and sub-district level at different earthquake intensities. The following system modules have been created: clusters (buildings) with respect to use; buildings with respect to construction typology; and estimations of damage to clusters, human losses and injuries, and the need for shelters. The paper not only examines the components of the DSS-DM, but also looks at its application in Besiktas municipality in the city of Istanbul, Turkey.     

Book Reviews

Books reviewed:
John Twigg and Mihir R. Bhatt, eds, Understanding Vulnerability
Joachim von Braun, Tesfaye Teklu and Patrick Webb, Famine in Africa: Causes, Responses, and Prevention
C. Emdad Haque, Hazrads in a Fickle Environment: Bangladesh
Walter Gillis Peacock, Betty Hearn Morrow and Hugh Gladwin, eds, Population and Food: Global Trends and Future Prospects
Roy Gutman and David Rieff, eds, Crimes of War: What the Public Should Know     

Continue to blame it on the rain? Conceptualization of drought and failure of food systems in the Greater Horn of Africa

Food insecurity continues to be prevalent in parts of Africa. In December 2015, there were approximately 21.6 million food insecure people in the Horn and East Africa. Climate change is likely to exacerbate current volatility of agricultural production and lead to further food insecurity. Whilst the academic literature has acknowledged the complexity of food insecurity and systems, it is not clear to what extent this has been translated into practice. We argue that there is a tendency to explain complex failures of food systems as ‘droughts’, with insufficient attention paid to other drivers. We analyse humanitarian documents and climate outlook statements in Ethiopia, Kenya and Somalia and assess how these are reflected in the humanitarian responses to food insecurity in the region by analysing the financing of humanitarian operations. Our findings indicate that the continued evolution in understanding the complex causes of food insecurity and attempts to move away from emergency relief to a more sophisticated approach has not translated into an observable change in humanitarian responses. The reasons behind this persistence of short-term relief, which is being justified with reference to climatic factors, mainly drought, would warrant further research into the decision-making process that triggers humanitarian responses.

List of abbreviations: ACF: Action Contre le Faim; DCM: Drought Cycle Management; DEC: Disaster Emergency Committee; ECHO: European Commission Humanitarian Office; EU: European Union; EWS: Early Warning System; FAO: Food and Agricultural Organization; FEWSNET: Famine Early Warning System Network; FSNAU: Food Security and Nutrition Analysis Unit; FTS: Financial Tracking Service; GHACOF: Greater Horn of Africa Climate Outlook Forum; GIEWS: Global Information and Early Warning System; IASC: Inter Agency Standing Committee; ICPAC: IGAD Climate Application and Prediction Centre; IFRC: International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies; IGAD: Inter-Governmental Authority on Development; IPCC: International Panel for Climate Change; LEWS: Livestock Early Warning System; ODI: Overseas Development Initiative; PASDEP: Plan for Accelerated and Sustained Development to Eradicate Poverty; PSNP: Productive Safety Net Programme; UNDRO: United Nations Disaster Relief Office; UNISDR: United Nations International; UN OCHA: United Nations Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs; USAID: United States Agency for International Development; WFP: World Food Programme     

Natural hazard events and social capital: the social impact of natural disasters

This study investigates if and to what extent natural disasters affect social capital. Twelve different events in Europe are examined in a quantitative analysis, using data derived from the European Social Survey and the EM‐DAT International Disaster Database. The study uses social trust as an indicator of social capital and offers evidence that a change in social trust is a possible occurrence during or after a disaster, but that it is not an inevitable consequence of it. The results reveal that social trust decreases after a disaster with a death toll of at least nine. Changes in social capital, therefore, are found to be more probable as the severity of the event increases. National, rather than regional, disasters lead more frequently to significant shifts in social trust. This evaluation of 12 separate cases pinpoints several disasters that have had an effect on social trust, but it does not identify any general patterns, underlining the significance of contextual dependency.