Governing systemic and cascading disaster risk in Indonesia: where do we stand and future outlook

PurposeThis paper aims to identify key factors for a contextualised Systemic Risk Governance (SRG) framework and subsequently explore how systemic risks can be managed and how local institutional mechanisms can be tweaked to deal with the complex Indonesian risk landscape.Design/methodology/approachUsing a case study from Palu triple-disasters in Central Sulawesi, Indonesia, the authors demonstrate how inland earthquakes in 2018 created cascading secondary hazards, namely tsunamis, liquefactions and landslides, caused unprecedented disasters for the communities and the nation. A qualitative analysis was conducted using the data collected through a long-term observation since 2002.FindingsThe authors argue that Indonesia has yet to incorporate an SRG approach in its responses to the Palu triple-disasters. Political will is required to adopt more appropriate risk governance modes that promote the systemic risk paradigm. Change needs to occur incrementally through hybrid governance arrangements ranging from formal/informal methods to self- and horizontal and vertical modes of governance deemed more realistic and feasible. The authors recommend that this be done by focusing on productive transition and local transformation.Originality/valueThere is growing awareness and recognition of the importance of systemic and cascading risks in disaster risk studies. However, there are still gaps between research, policy and practice. The current progress of disaster risk governance is not sufficient to achieve the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction (2015–2030) unless there is an effective governing system in place at the local level that allow actors and institutions to simultaneously manage the interplays of multi-hazards, multi-temporal, multi-dimensions of vulnerabilities and residual risks. This paper contributes to these knowledge gaps.

The Social Vulnerability Index: A Literature Review

This chapter provides a non-exhaustive review of the literature on the Social Vulnerability Index in order to share with Disaster Studies scholars and other professionals a general overview of the subject. This work analyzes selected case studies on the construction of a Social Vulnerability Index at national and local scales, and then specifically focuses on cases concerning social vulnerability to climate change, natural hazards, and COVID-19. © 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.

Crisis, Colonialism and Constitutional Habits: Indigenous jurisdiction in times of emergency

The Tŝilhqot'in Nation has had ample experience exercising its laws and jurisdiction to manage emergencies during record-breaking wildfires and the COVID-19 pandemic. Despite the Nation's unique opportunity to formally describe and advance its jurisdiction through its landmark Aboriginal title declaration and beyond, in these crises, Crown actors have defaulted to well-worn patterns of colonialism. Through a detailed analysis of recent Tŝilhqot'in experiences of emergency, we argue that provincial and federal responses to these extreme events reveal constitutional habits: patterns of decision-making that emerge in the immediate response to an emergency, so as to appear automatic. Crown emergency responses assume exhaustive Crown jurisdiction and its corollary erasure and dispossession of Tŝilhqot'in jurisdiction. Fortunately, however, habits can change. We show how Tŝilhqot'in responses to emergency reveal alternate constitutional possibilities: habits of coordination, which, through their attention to responsible relationships, build capacity to respond to emergencies and, more broadly, a changing world. © 2023 The Author(s).

The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and pandemic-related policies on new firm creation: an analysis of the Italian case

This work contributes to disaster research by exploring the impact on new firm creation of the COVID-19 pandemic and the pandemic-related policies. We develop hypotheses on the individual and combined effects of pandemic severity and public policies aimed at controlling the spread of the disease (shutdown policies) or protecting the economy from its negative consequences (demand stimulus and firm support policies). Then, we test these hypotheses using data on Italy in the first and second 2020 pandemic waves. Results show that pandemic severity negatively affected new firm creation during the first wave. Shutdown policies had negative effects too, especially in the regions where the pandemic was less severe. The effects of demand stimulus policies were positive and stronger the less severe the pandemic was while the impact of firm support policies was negative in the regions where the pandemic was more severe. All these effects vanished in the second wave.Plain English SummaryDisasters cause slowdowns in new firm creation that disaster recovery policies may aggravate or alleviate. Our analysis of the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic in Italy reveals that this major disaster resulted in a large drop in new firm creation rates. During the first pandemic wave, the drop was concentrated in the regions where the pandemic was more severe. Examining the effects of the shutdown policies implemented to contain the spread of the disease and the measures designed to protect the economy provides useful guidelines for policymakers. First, we show that shutdown policies inhibit new firm creation. Policymakers can however alleviate this negative effect by implementing less strict measures in the areas not severely affected by the disaster. Second, despite we understand that policymakers need to provide relief to existing firms in the most affected industries to avoid business failures, we indicate they should simultaneously invest in stimulating demand in these industries to sustain also new firm creation.

Czy badać? Co badać? Jak badać? Strategie badawcze w naukach społecznych i humanistycznych w pierwszej fali pandemii COVID-19

Celem opracowania jest opis strategii badawczych podejmowanych przez badaczki i badaczy z obszaru nauk społecznych i humanistycznych w czasie pierwszej fali pandemii COVID-19. Badania empiryczne będące podstawą artykułu realizowane były w kwietniu i maju 2020 roku przy użyciu techniki ankiety jakościowej online. W wyniku jakościowej analizy treści wypowiedzi uczestników i uczestniczek naszych badań scharakteryzowałyśmy cztery strategie badawcze: rezygnację, zawieszenie, kontynuację i (re)konstrukcję badań. Wyniki analiz opisujemy w odniesieniu do cech charakterystycznych nurtu disaster research. Pokazujemy, że badania w pandemii są bliższe perspektywie slow disaster research niż disaster research.Alternate :The aim of this paper is to describe the research strategies carried out by female and male researchers in the social sciences and humanities during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic. The empirical research which the article is based on was conducted in April and May 2020 using an online qualitative survey. As a result of the qualitative content analysis of our research participants' statements, we characterized four research strategies: resignation, suspension, continuation, and research (re)construction. We describe the results of the analyses in relation to the characteristics of disaster research. We indicate that research in a pandemic is relatable to the slow disaster research perspective more than to the disaster research perspective.

Disasters, Continuity, and the Pathological Normal

In this introductory essay to our symposium we argue that "Sociology After COVID-19" needs to center "disaster" itself as an object of study and theory, and that doing so can productively reframe sociology's fundamental concerns. Building off nascent interdisciplinary work in critical disaster studies, as well as on the insights of our own contributors, we advance and elaborate two theses. First, while disasters are disruptive, they are not purely so;as they unfold, they enfold continuities such that they are best understood as a part of social reality rather than apart from it. Second, disasters are not pathological deviations from "normal" so much as they are the most salient manifestations of the ways that the normal is in fact pathological. A more critical approach to disaster can lead sociologists to examine more closely the interrelationship between the production of continuities and ruptures in social and economic life, enriching our understanding of core disciplinary concerns about social change, stratification, and inequality.

Seeking Shelter: How Housing and Urban Exclusion Shape Exurban Disaster

From extreme weather to infectious disease, disasters now arrive in ever more rapid succession, combining with and compounding one another with increasing complexity and potential for crisis. In this context I suggest a particularly important site for analysis and intervention: the chronic lack of affordable housing and broader processes of exclusion now prevalent in cities around the world. These dynamics, I argue, help drive increasing movement to and development in interface zones between urban, rural, and undeveloped areas. In so doing, they also are implicated in a range of "exurban disasters", including wildfires and infectious disease, and in the broader crises these disasters generate for vulnerable populations. The article develops this relational argument across three moments. First, I posit contemporary dynamics of housing crisis and urban exclusion, which prevent people from finding adequate shelter in cities, as key drivers of displacement and settlement across various framings of urban interface zones - from the Wildlands Urban Interface [WUI] to the peri-urban fringe. I then explore how the increasingly forced settlement in these zones - themselves destabilized by prior processes of settler colonialism, neoliberal land-use planning, and climate change - contribute to both environmental and health related disasters. Here I focus on two contemporary cases: catastrophic wildfire in the WUI of California, and the emergence of zoonotic diseases in peri-urban regions around the world. Finally, with a focus on California, I explore how, once health and environmental disasters land and combine within a single location, inadequate housing increases the likelihood of multiple forms of exposure and susceptibility - e.g. to toxic smoke, respiratory ailments, and COVID. In conclusion, I argue for increased scholarly and political focus on the role of housing crises and urban exclusion in both the origins and outcomes of disaster. More scholarly and political work is needed that bridges city and hinterland, linking disaster research to critical approaches in housing studies and urban political ecology, together with wildfire ecology, epidemiology, and environmental stewardship.

Interruptions: imagining an analytical otherwise for disaster studies in Latin America

Purpose>Based on the research, the authors identify how four key concepts in disaster studies—agency, local scale, memory and vulnerability—are interrupted, and how these interruptions offer new perspectives for doing disaster research from and for the South.Design/methodology/approach>Meta-analysis of case studies and revision of past and current collaborations of authors with communities across Chile.Findings>The findings suggest that agency, local scale, memory and vulnerability, as fundamental concepts for disaster risk reduction (DRR) theory and practice, need to allow for ambivalences, ironies, granularization and further materializations. The authors identify these characteristics as the conditions that emerge when doing disaster research from within the disaster itself, perhaps the critical condition of what is usually known as the South.Originality/value>The authors contribute to a reflexive assessment of fundamental concepts for critical disaster studies. The authors offer research-based and empirically rich redefinitions of these concepts. The authors also offer a novel understanding of the political and epistemological conditions of the “South” as both a geography and a project.

Epistemological freedom: activating co-learning and co-production to decolonise knowledge production

Purpose>The purpose of the paper is to challenge and address the limitations of the traditional system of knowledge production that is embedded in disaster and climate change research studies, and research studies in general. It argues that knowledge production in research processes conforms to colonialist thinking or west-inspired approaches. Such a system often results in the omission of crucial information due to a lack of participation, inclusion and diversity in knowledge production.Design/methodology/approach>The paper proposes practices and recommendations to decolonise knowledge production in disaster and climate change research studies, and research studies in general. It provides a brief literature review on the concepts of decolonisation of knowledge and epistemological freedom, and its origins;assesses the need for knowledge decolonisation, emphasising on the integration of local knowledge from grassroots women-led initiatives in instances where disasters and crises are being investigated in vulnerable communities, especially in the Global South;and finally the paper proposes to decolonise knowledge production through activating co-learning and co-production. The practices have been developed from the work of relevant authors in the field and case studies.Findings>Through a brief literature review on previous discourses on the topic of knowledge decolonisation and analysis of recent case studies on disaster and crisis management and community resilience, the paper finds that there exists a lack of pluralism and inclusion in epistemology which limits the pursuit to obtain the whole truth in the production of knowledge in research studies.Originality/value>This paper adds to the discussion of decolonisation of knowledge in the field of disaster and climate change research studies, and research processes in general. It provides in-depth analyses of recent case studies of emerging community resilience and local practices that were crucial in the face of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) crisis.

Cross-country use of participatory research methods in practice to enhance inclusive decision-making

Purpose>Rethinking participation in disaster research and practice could be facilitated when practitioners are provided with opportunities to pause and reflect deeply on their work outside of the context of their own individual projects and organizational networks. The article draws from an extended collaboration between researchers from multiple countries and disciplines in a working group, which aimed at exploring ethics, participation and power in disaster management.Design/methodology/approach>Under responsible engineering science and technology for disaster risk management, the authors undertook weekly meetings over four months to discuss various facets of adopting participatory methods in their individual projects in Nepal, India, the Philippines and the USA. The article develops a critical reflection of practice using an auto-ethnographical and poly-vocal approach.Findings>The voluntary, digital, sustained, unstructured, recurring and inter-disciplinary characteristics of the authors' working group created an opportunity for researchers and practitioners from different fields and different national, cultural and linguistic backgrounds to come together and collectively issues related to participation, ethics and power.Research limitations/implications>In the paper, the authors do not offer a systematic evaluation of what was a fairly unique process. The paper offers no evaluation of the working group or others like it that focus on questions of replicability, scale and sustainability.Originality/value> To the best of the authors' knowledge, the current work is a unique paper that focuses on situating multi-disciplinary practice within disaster risk management (DRM) and enhancing networks, capacities and expertise for professional education for engineers, physical and social scientists who are involved in research and practice. The polyvocal character of the presentation will help readers access the particular experiences of the participants, which reflect the deeply personal character of the subject matter.

Reviewing the place of migrants in disasters: a personal perspective

Purpose>The paper aims to call attention to issues that may be missing or taken for granted in discourses on migrants and disasters by applying the author’s viewpoint to reflect on gaps and potentials for disaster risk reduction.Design/methodology/approach>The author discusses key issues based on reflective engagement with selected secondary documentation in the form of grey and scholarly literature. Personal perspectives are engaged to develop arguments on intersections that are relevant to the migrant situation in different frameworks in disaster studies.Findings>While migrants are considered significant stakeholders in key global agreements on disaster and migration, encounters with disaster literature from a more localised level reveal how references to the migrant sector can be omitted or racialised. This gap can be filled by searching for documentation of migrant strengths and vulnerabilities. However, further reflection demonstrates how adopting broader perspectives can reveal these strengths and vulnerabilities as part of more appropriate and sustainable disaster risk reduction strategies. The paper also shows how such reflections can be led by insights from migrants themselves, not as subjects to be managed but as agents of their own change.Originality/value>The paper is distinctive because it shows aspects of migrant strengths and disadvantages from a personal viewpoint. It amplifies less-heard perspectives on a conceptual level as well as in actual practice.

A Temporal Device: Disasters and the Articulation of (De)acceleration in and beyond 1970 Ancash's Earthquake

Historically, disaster studies have been confronted with two antagonistic, but not exclusive, conceptualizations of catastrophes: first and foremost, extreme singularities that produce history, but also processes that perpetuate sociopolitical structures and inequalities. By exploring how the 1970 earthquake in Ancash, Peru was the scenario for implementing discourses of acceleration and deceleration amid strong transformations in Peruvian society, this article presents an alternative understanding of disasters beyond disruption and continuity by focusing on the temporal articulations they induce. When conceived as temporal devices, disasters have the capacity of restructuring rhythms, scales, and temporalities heterogeneously and manifoldly. This paper aims to bring forward arguments that, although grounded in the 1970 Ancash earthquake, can be applied to other discussions of disasters, catastrophes, and crises as triggering scenarios of economic, social, or cultural acceleration and deceleration.

Social vulnerability and the impact of policy responses to COVID-19 on disabled people.

In this paper, we propose a conceptual framework for understanding the impact of the policy responses to COVID-19 on disabled people. These responses have overwhelmingly focused on individual vulnerability, which has been used as a justification for removing or restricting rights. This suggests the need to shift the attention towards the social determinants of disabled people's vulnerability. We do this by bringing literature on social vulnerability in disaster risk management or 'disaster studies' in contact with key concepts in disability studies such as the social model of disability, independent living, intersectionality, and biopower. Empirically, we draw on the findings of the global COVID-19 Disability Rights Monitor (www.covid-drm.org), as well as on reports from academic journals, civil society publications, and internet blogs. We put the proposed conceptual framework to work by developing a critical analysis of COVID-19 policies in three interrelated areas-institutional treatment and confinement of disabled people, intersectional harms, and access to health care. Our conclusion links this analysis with strategies to address disabled people's social vulnerability in post-pandemic reconstruction efforts. We make a case for policies that address the social, economic, and environmental conditions that disproportionately expose disabled people to natural disasters and hazards.

Social media as a modern Emergency Broadcast System: A longitudinal qualitative study of social media during COVID-19 and its impacts on social connection and social distancing compliance.

In the wake of COVID-19 social distancing recommendations, social media assumed a central - if unofficial - role in ensuring that individuals remained informed and connected throughout the pandemic. Yet while research shows that social media can be an effective platform for connecting individuals socially and fostering social support exchanges, both the platforms and the support exchanged therein have been mired in considerable controversies regarding their use as a tool for positive social engagement. The goal of this study is to qualitatively evaluate longitudinal changes to social media engagement during social distancing recommendations and orders to shelter-in-place. To do this, we collected longitudinal, qualitative survey data from a group of adults over the eight weeks during which most states had issued orders to shelter-in-place. We analyze data for evidence of social connection, stress reduction, and support exchange, and evaluate the impact of online social ties on staying informed and on compliance with CDC recommendations and shelter-in-place orders. Results showed a clear longitudinal evolution of users' online social engagement. Early use was characterized by agentic purposeful engagement, information sharing, and community resource mobilization. However, over time these patterns gave way to more passive use characterized by listlessness, contentiousness and misinformation as the pandemic wore on in weeks. As social media comes to occupy an increasingly important role in the exchange of information (and misinformation) this study has important implications for the health of users and the role of social media in future disasters, including how social media impacts both stress and health related behaviors.