Authors
Terry Cannon
Publication date
2015
Book
Cultures and Disasters: Understanding Cultural Framings in Disaster Risk Reduction
Pages
88
Publisher
Routledge
Description
If we are to understand disasters as being a result of people’s vulnerability, then it is essential to understand all factors and processes that cause that vulnerability. This chapter argues that while economic and political processes that generate vulnerability have been fairly well understood and integrated with vulnerability analysis, there is a significant gap relating to culture. The idea that disasters (those related to natural hazards) must be regarded as being socially constructed and not ‘natural’has been well established for many decades. It is widely accepted by most academics and organisations that operate in disaster research and risk reduction (DRR)(cf. Hewitt 1983, Blaikie et al. 1984, Wijkman and Timberlake 1984, Wisner et al. 2004). Using this perspective, a disaster happens only when the people who experience the hazard are made vulnerable to it by a range of social factors. These factors can also create …
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