Nibedita S. Ray-Bennett

The influence of caste, class and gender in surviving multiple disasters: A case study from Orissa, India

Sociological and anthropological studies in India reveal that caste, class and gender in everyday life are both rigid and dynamic, but little is known about how they influence the survival mechanisms of women during ‘multiple disasters’, nor about how women negotiate with these structural mores to meet their cultural and biological needs. This is explored through the experiences of 12 women-headed households from different social castes in Orissa, India. Multiple disasters or disasters that occur in ‘one specific place’ (such as floods, cyclone and drought) are regular events in coastal parts of the state of Orissa. The super-cyclone of 1999, two floods of 2001 and 2003 and drought of 2000 and 2002 form the case study. Participant observation, in-depth interviews and documentary evidence complement the fieldwork. The findings suggest a complex interplay of caste, class and gender in surviving the multiple disasters including structural mutability under the purview of social organization. In doing so, women demonstrated their individual and collective agencies in order to meet their cultural and biological needs under severe crisis. This research stresses that gender and disaster studies must include a consideration of caste and class for effective disaster management and social vulnerability reduction.

Exploring the meaning of health security for disaster resilience through people's perspectives in Bangladesh.

There has been significant interest in the rhetoric of health security in recent years from both global and local perspectives. Understanding health in the context of disaster vulnerability presents an opportunity to examine how improved health might reduce the effects of environmental disasters and other crises. To this end, a project was implemented in Bangladesh to establish the potential of a health security approach for disaster resilience amongst people living in high risk environments. This paper explores what we might mean by health security through engaging community level perspectives in the southeast coastal belt of Bangladesh, an area prone to cyclone and flood. This has been examined with respect to variation in gender and wealth of households. Household surveys, interviews and focus group discussions were some of the methods used to collect data. The findings show that health related coping strategies and agentive capabilities in the context of impending crises vary from one micro-context to the next. This suggests a dynamic and integrative resilience that could be built on further, but one which remains remote from wider discourses on health security.

High Impact/ Low Frequency extreme events: Enabling Reflection and Resilience in a Hyper-connected World

Abstract Helbing (2013:51) poignantly argues that ‘Globalization and technological revolutions are changing our planet’. Along with the benefits and opportunities associated with worldwide collaboration networks comes ‘pathways along which dangerous and damaging events can spread rapidly and globally’. With our hyper-connected world underpinned by hyper or hybrid-risks, the impact of unexpected events such as floods, earthquakes, financial crisis, and cyber-attacks has revealed the fragility and vulnerabilities that lie within the social/technological/economic/political/ecological interdependent systems. In particular, events that affect critical infrastructure such as damage to electric power, telecommunications, transportation, health care systems, financial markets and water-supply systems can have local, regional and global impact. Taleb (2007) calls these extreme events ‘Black swans’ to describe their inherent quality of surprise. Many of the systemic risks that characterize Natural Hazard triggered Technological disasters (NATECH) often arise from unanticipated consequences of interactions within and between different types of systems. Johnson and Tivnan (2012:65) argue that, ‘…understanding, controlling and predicting extreme behavior [of NATECH] is an important strategic goal to support resilience planning’. In this light, a new paradigm is required to support disaster risk reduction (DRR) embedded in hyper-risks; one that will develop not only anticipatory measures for risk management but also prepare for the unpredictable and the ‘unknown’ by building organisational resilience for hyper-risks in general and NATECH disasters in particular. In this paper we explore the emergency management domain associated with the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear accident to show the hyper-connectivity and hyper-risks that permeated the problem space and thereby show how ‘reflective responses’ underpinned by ‘critical reflective practices’ can be used to support resilience in such a complex disaster.

Everyday health security practices as disaster resilience in rural Bangladesh

ABSTRACT Health security is a relatively new concept in terms of how it is practised in disaster-prone locales. We observed 10 rural households in Bangladesh for four months using informal interviews, field diaries, and observation. The findings suggest that the everyday practises of health security involve the capabilities of “caring for themselves” in resource-constrained contexts. Understanding how households care for themselves prior to and during disasters presents an opportunity to examine how improved health might reduce the effects of disasters, ill health, and poverty. Some interventions are proposed to improve health security for poorer households in general and women in particular.

Indigenous indicators of health security in relation to climatic disasters in Bangladesh

Health is a core aspect of human security. Meanwhile human security is considered to reduce disaster risk. However, despite this logically derived association, we could find no studies that provide evidence of how people residing in the worlds most environmentally at risk locations view health as a defence against disasters. This article therefore draws on findings from our research showing how people at risk of major climatic events in Bangladesh interpret disasters and accompanying health security indicators. The findings show that health is locally considered a protector against climate-related environmental hazards and that there are differences between individual and community level indicators. Health security in contexts of indigenously defined hazards and disasters at these study sites was based on a combination of economic and social processes related to food, livelihoods and finance. The study shows that health can underpin the means that a local community gains security in contexts of major climatic risks. The study shows the importance of a locally based and people-centred understanding of climatic hazards and disasters and the processes underlying health and wellbeing.

Systems Failure Revisited

This chapter summarises the previous chapters and outlines some of the limitations of systems failure. In doing so, this chapter proposes an emerging tool called ‘systems alignment’. Perfect systems alignment is neither proposed nor is it possible in this real world because of people’s subjective world views, different frames of reference, unique communication structures, cultures and the like. However, a weaker version of systems alignment, or some accommodation over the issue of reducing death can also lead to positive outcomes, as observed in the case of Cyclone Phailin by designing an overall goal of ‘zero casualty at any cost’ for the disaster management system. This chapter also outlines some organisational learnings that can take place from the findings of this research as well as some impact for policy and theory change in Odisha and beyond.

Cycolne Phailin in 2013

This chapter presents the gender disaggregated death data from the four districts which were severely hit by the Cyclone Phailin in 2013. As with Chap. 3, it also provides the narratives of seven elite respondents which include the Director of the Indian Meteorology Department, Regional Director of UNDP, Manager of Odisha State Disaster Management Authority, Deputy Relief Commissioner of the Special Relief Organisation, and three Emergency Officers from Ganjam, Jagatsinghpur and Puri districts. Systems failure provides a novel perspective to analyse the reasons why there were fewer deaths in 2013.

Avoidable Deaths in Disasters

This chapter presents the concept of ‘avoidable deaths’ conceived from the theories of risk, violence, justice and organisation. Avoidable deaths are preventable deaths due to advancements in disaster management science and weather forecasting systems; increased sophistication in human-built environments, as well as ongoing economic and policy development worldwide. When avoidable deaths continue to happen, this is event violence. Violence is commenced by the relevant actors and organisations in failing to protect or save lives. Deaths in disasters, in this vein, are a case for violation of justice. In the event of disasters, justice is denied to those women, men and children who would have otherwise lived a long life and an accomplished life. In order to promote justice in disasters, three arguments are put forward. First, human deaths must be identified as a matter of justice; as such they should receive a high priority from the disaster management system by developing a ‘goal’ to reduce death. Second, problems can be framed, as well as solved within a disaster management system through support-led processes, such as effective INGO, NGO, community and government organisation coordination and communication. Third, it can make room for demands of duty from the actors and organisations involved in protecting lives (Sen, Bull World Health Organ 77(8):619–623, 1999; Sen, The idea of justice, 2009). This chapter also introduces the case study of Odisha along with the research methods used to conduct the fieldwork between 2013 and 2014.

Super-Cyclone in 1999

This chapter introduces the case studies. On 17–18 October 1999, Odisha, an Indian state was affected by a super-cyclone (wind velocity of 270–300 km/h) which killed more than 10,000 people. In 2013, Odisha was hit by another cyclone called Phailin on 12 October 2013 (wind velocity 260 km/h). Only 86 people died. This chapter presents the gender disaggregated death data from the four districts which were severely hit in 1999. It also provides the narratives of seven elite respondents who included the Director of the Indian Meteorology Department, Regional Director of UNDP, Manager of Odisha State Disaster Management Authority, Deputy Relief Commissioner of the Special Relief Organisation, as well as three Emergency Officers from Ganjam, Jagatsinghpur and Puri districts. Systems failure provides a novel perspective to analyse the reasons why there were so many deaths in the Super-Cyclone.

Systems Failure in Disasters

This chapter explains why deaths in disasters occur by taking two overarching perspectives: risk and vulnerability. Risk or the traditional perspective gives the advantage of understanding the dynamics of geohazards and their effect on humans. Vulnerability perspective on the other hand, helps in explaining why some groups of people are more vulnerable to disasters than others due to their class, gender, age, and race identities. This chapter also adds on an additional perspective to explain deaths in disasters. This is a complex perspective. In this perspective, deaths occur due to the vulnerabilities that exist in the seams of disaster management system. This system is a conglomeration of different professional groupings and actors designed for specific tasks and goals. It is also a system that is highly reliant on technology. As such, loose coordination and communication between actors can lead disaster management system to fail. To showcase, how the disaster management system can fail to save lives, an analytical tool for systems failure is presented with its three inter-connected components: coordination, communication and world views.