Mainstreaming risk reduction in urban planning and housing: a challenge for international aid organisations

The effects of 'natural' disasters in cities can be worse than in other environments, with poor and marginalised urban communities in the developing world being most at risk. To avoid post-disaster destruction and the forced eviction of these communities, proactive and preventive urban planning, including housing, is required. This paper examines current perceptions and practices within international aid organisations regarding the existing and potential roles of urban planning as a tool for reducing disaster risk. It reveals that urban planning confronts many of the generic challenges to mainstreaming risk reduction in development planning. However, it faces additional barriers. The main reasons for the identified lack of integration of urban planning and risk reduction are, first, the marginal position of both fields within international aid organisations, and second, an incompatibility between the respective professional disciplines. To achieve better integration, a conceptual shift from conventional to non-traditional urban planning is proposed. This paper suggests related operative measures and initiatives to achieve this change.     

高应力巷道底臌变形机理及控制技术分析

为了分析高应力巷道底臌变形机理,以铜川玉华煤矿2407工作面巷道为研究背景,采用理论分析和现场观测相结合的研究方法。根据巷道底臌主要由原岩应力、支承应力、围岩遇水膨胀、流变作用而引起进行分析,推导出计算底臌量的表达式。针对玉华煤矿高应力巷道底臌变形,提出在巷道顶板采用锚网梁索支护,帮部采用锚网支护的原支护条件下,底板采用锚杆注浆和切槽联合支护方式控制底臌。现场观测结果表明:这种联合支护方式能够有效控制巷道底臌变形,底臌量降低了61.5%。将底臌量理论解与现场监测的结果进行比较,误差小于8.93%,验证了理论的合理性,为巷道底臌量分析提供了参考。     

社会资本对山区居民山洪灾害应急避险能力的影响研究*

为研究社会资本对山区居民应急避险能力的影响,在广泛调研的基础上采用结构方程模型分析社会资本与山区居民应急避险能力各要素之间的作用关系。结果表明:个人网络对避险知识和避险意识有显著的正向影响,对避险行为影响不显著;信任与避险知识和避险意识呈显著的正向影响,而与避险行为呈反向影响,但信任可以通过避险知识和避险意识间接正向影响避险行为;互惠对避险知识影响不显著,但互惠与避险意识和避险行为存在显著的正向关系;避险知识和避险意识对避险行为呈显著正向影响,其中避险意识对避险行为影响更为显著。因此可以通过增加山区居民社会资本的方式提高山区居民山洪灾害应急避险能力。     

基于复杂网络的燃气管线破裂灾害链风险分析*

为提高燃气管线突发事件应急处置决策水平和应急响应能力及效率,采用复杂网络理论和灾害链演化机理对燃气管线破裂灾害事件影响进行耦合分析,构建燃气管线破裂灾害链网络和风险评估模型,并计算得出燃气管线破裂灾害链风险度。为更准确地表达无传播路径的灾害事件之间的关系,将灾害网络中所有最短路径长度的最大值作为其最短路径长度,计算表明这种算法更符合灾害传播实际情况。结果表明:通过燃气管线破裂灾害链风险分析,能够为燃气管线灾害风险控制措施和方案制定提供参考,有利于提高燃气管线破裂灾害事件的应急处置能力和决策水平。     

突发事件下安全舆情的传播与演变——以江苏响水天嘉宜化工有限公司“3.21”特别重大爆炸事故为例

为明确突发事件安全舆情传播与演变路径,提高企业防控突发事件安全舆情传播风险能力,降低衍生灾害发生概率,在文献分析及事故致因理论基础上,构建突发事件安全舆情传播与演变过程的系统动力学（SD）模型,并运用Vensim软件对以江苏响水天嘉宜化工有限公司“3.21”特别重大爆炸事故为例进行仿真实验,模拟安全舆情传播与演变动态过程。结果表明:突发事件安全舆情传播与演变主要受事件自身、媒体、相关企业监管层、相关企业执行层4个主体的共同影响,其中事件自身因素起效时间最早,相关企业监管层影响作用最大、维持时间最持久,相关企业执行层影响最直接。     

基于灾害风险评估的山地城市固定避难场所布局优化研究——以东川区为例

研究以各区域灾害风险评估系数作为权重系数,对山地小城市各区域避难场所进行优化布局。首先,通过风险值=危险性*脆弱性/抗灾救灾能力机理表达式构建灾害风险评估指标体系,并以模糊综合评价法得出灾害风险评估数值,在此基础上通过多目标选址优化模型来构建山地城市避难场所的优化模型,其中灾害风险评估系数作为影响布局的权重因素纳入其中。最后,以东川区为研究对象,对其固定避难场所进行优化布局研究,结果表明:东川区城区固定避灾场所数量可在接近最优解的情况下达到效果最优。     

What happened to the Second World? Earthquakes and postsocialism in Kazakhstan

There is an assumption that with the disintegration of the Soviet Union, the Second World ceased to exist. Yet the demise of the Communist bloc as a geopolitical reality did not mean that it stopped exerting a defining influence over how people think and behave. This article examines how the postsocialist state in Kazakhstan deals with potential crises such as earthquakes and the extent to which the Soviet legacy still shapes intellectual debates, state structures, and civil society organisations in in that country. Drawing on fieldwork and interviews, this paper re-examines the Second World in its historical context and re-establishes it as a conceptual framework for considering disaster risk reduction in the former Soviet bloc. It argues that it is essential to pay attention to this legacy in Kazakhstan both in policy and practice if earthquake risk reduction is to be made more effective.     

Hurricane Harvey and Greater Houston households: comparing pre-event preparedness with post-event health effects,event exposures,and recovery

Most disaster studies rely on convenience sampling and ‘after-only’ designs to assess impacts. This paper, focusing on Hurricane Harvey (2017) and leveraging a pre-/post-event sample of Greater Houston households (n=71) in the United States, establishes baselines for disaster preparedness and home structure flood hazard mitigation, explores household-level ramifications, and examines how preparedness and mitigation relate to health effects, event exposures, and recovery. Between 70 and 80 per cent of participants instituted preparedness measures. Mitigation actions varied: six per cent had interior drainage systems and 83 per cent had elevated indoor heating/cooling components. Sixty per cent reported home damage. One-half highlighted allergies and two-thirds indicated some level of post-traumatic stress (PTS). Three-quarters worried about family members/friends. The results of generalised linear models revealed that greater pre- event mitigation was associated with fewer physical health problems and adverse experiences, lower PTS, and faster recovery. The study design exposed the broad benefits of home structure flood hazard mitigation for households after Harvey.     

Listing for change? Exploring the politics of relief lists in Bangladesh after Cyclone Sidr

Ideal notions of efficient aid are challenged continuously by realities on the ground in the wake of major disasters, such as dire needs, limited resources, and opportunism. This paper demonstrates how ‘relief lists’ can be productive entry points for a systematic inquiry into the pervasive politics of disaster assistance. Through an analysis of qualitative data collected during the five years after Cyclone Sidr struck Bangladesh on 15 November 2007, it examines how relief lists featured in both physical and phantom forms and then developed beyond their transparency-making aims, becoming elevated sites of struggle for post-disaster resources. Three list processes, selected to indicate the temporal, material, and spatial dynamics of relief encounters, are assessed in depth. Although recipients of cyclone relief appreciated its value, the paper argues that list politics also stimulated structures of vulnerability, including inequality. Gradually, relief, as governed after Sidr, also served to restore the differential vulnerability of the country's coastal poor.     

Survivor needs or logistical convenience? Factors shaping decisions to deliver relief to earthquake‐affected communities,Pakistan 2005–06

In Bureaucratizing the Good Samaritan , Waters (2001) argues that bureaucratic rationality distracts humanitarian agencies from the needs of the people they are supposed to assist, in favour of other values that their institutional frameworks dictate. We test his claim by investigating the response to the Pakistan 2005 earthquake. One of us (Dittemore) worked with the United Nations Joint Logistics Centre in the theatre, managing a relief cargo shipment database. The response, known as 'Operation Winter Race', was hampered by extreme logistical challenges, but ultimately succeeded in averting a second disaster resulting from cold and starvation. We use statistical models to probe whether survivor needs significantly guided decisions to deliver relief to affected communities. Needs assessments remained incomplete and incoherent. We measure needs through proxy indicators and integrate them, on a Geographic Information System (GIS) platform, with logistics and relief delivery data. We find that, despite strong logistics effects, needs orientations were significant. However, the strength of decision factors varies between commodity types (food versus clothing and shelter versus reconstruction materials) as well as over the different phases of the response. This study confirms Thomas's observation that logistics databases are rich 'repositories of data that can be analyzed to provide post-event learning' (Thomas, 2003, p. 4). This article is an invitation for others to engage in creative humanitarian data management.