The creation of vulnerability to natural disaster: Case studies from the Dominican Republic*

This paper argues that natural disasters are not a category of events which can be separated from the broader Issues of development, since economic change can create vulnerability to natural disaster. The analysis of case studies from the Dominican Republic shows how the development of large scale commercialized agricultural production has created such vulnerability by reducing or restricting the resource base of certain sectors of the population. It b suggested that the vulnerable state of a population should be considered as much a cause of natural disaster as the extreme physical phenomena Involved. Therefore there Is a need both for a broader framework for analysis of disasters and for strategies to reduce such vulnerability to be an Integral part of long term development planning.