**UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO**

**Professional Development Centre**

**Natural City Conference**

**PRINCIPLES OF DISASTER MANAGEMENT WORKSHOP**

**Sponsored by the University of Toronto and York University**

**Friday 2 June 2006**

**Reporter:**

**Chris Webb**

**Auckland University of Technology**

**Akoranga Campus**

**Private Bag 92006**

**Auckland 1142**

**New Zealand**

**chris.webb@aut.ac.nz**

This workshop was part of the University of Toronto's Natural City
Conference and was open to those people involved in or interested in
Emergency Management. The workshop provided an opportunity to explore an
issue that is both central and critical to the fields of emergency and
disaster management, but which tends to be overlooked. It is from basic
principles that strategies, tactics and implementation develop, yet they
are often given little thought or are based upon unspoken or unrealised
assumptions. Conflict between organisations or diverging approaches to
disaster management often results from different operating principles,
which may not even be articulated.

**Purpose of Workshop**

The purpose of the ½ day workshop was to explore the rationale for the
discrepancies in the principles of Disaster Management between various
organisations and institutions.

**Format of Workshop**

Four well known and prestigious academics presented their perspective on
the notion of disaster and emergency management principles. This was
followed by a break out session, which under the facilitation of the key
speakers, explored the notion of principles further.

**Workshop Facilitator**

Professor David Etkin, York University

**Speakers**

Professor Ian Davis, Cranfield University, Oxford, UK

Terry Jeggle, United Nations International Strategy for Disaster
Reduction

Professor Kenneth Mitchell, Rutgers, State University of New Jersey

Professor Ken Hewitt, Wilfrid Laurier University, Canada

Each of the speakers provided their perspective on the notion of
disaster management principles. These perspectives ranged from
developing a hierarchy of principles through to questioning whether we
can develop meaningful disaster management principles.

**Perspective One**

**Ian Davis, Cranfield University, Oxford, UK**

Saw a need to have consistency in this area of principles of emergency
management after he saw that principles 'were all over the place'.

Put forward the notion that maybe principles could be hierarchical and
put forward the following hierarchy. He articulated that there were four
levels of principles:

-   Ethical, core principles (level 1)

-   Strategy principles (level 2)

-   Tactical principles (level 3)

-   Implementation principles (level 4)

Implementation Principles (Level 4)

Tactical Principles (Level 3)

Strategy Principles (Level 2)

Ethical, core values Principles (Level 1)

In looking at Disaster Recovery in Sri Lanka following the 2004 Tsunami
event, he tried to apply these principles. Davis saw five (5)
intertwining components of recovery in Sri Lanka.[^1]

1.  Psychosocial recovery of a cluster of bewildered survivors

2.  Economic recovery of fishermen having lost their jobs, boats and
    nets

3.  Physical recovery of dwellings and infrastructure

4.  Environmental recovery of the coastal eco-system

5.  Administrative recovery of destroyed government offices, records and
    loss of officials

He then posed the following questions for consideration:

-   What are the principles for each of these constructs?

-   How do the principles interlock because they are intertwined?

-   Is it a hierarchy of principles or is it a matrix? Is it one
    dimensional?

Example of the hierarchy of principles being applied to Disaster
Recovery following the 2004 Tsunami.

+---------+--------------+------------+--------------+---------------+
|         | **Ethical    | **Strategy | **Tactical   | **I           |
|         | Principles** | Pr         | Principles** | mplementation |
|         |              | inciples** |              | Principles**  |
|         | **(Level     |            | **(Level     |               |
|         | 1)**         | **(Level   | 3)**         | **(Level 4)** |
|         |              | 2)**       |              |               |
+---------+--------------+------------+--------------+---------------+
| Re      | Achieve full | Place      | Build the    | Monitor the   |
| silient | recovery     | emphasis   | capacity and | progress in   |
|         | from major   | on         | resilience   | building      |
| D       | disasters    | pr         | of           | resilience by |
| isaster | requires the | e-disaster | government   | evaluating    |
|         | commitment   | planning   | officials    | programmes    |
| R       | of all       | to lay     | through      | against       |
| ecovery | stakeholders | down the   | training and | agreed bench  |
|         |              | foundation | staff        | marks at      |
|         |              | of         | development  | least every 6 |
|         |              | resilient  | programmes   | months:       |
|         |              | c          |              |               |
|         |              | ommunities |              | Consider:     |
|         |              |            |              |               |
|         |              |            |              | -   staff     |
|         |              |            |              |     training  |
|         |              |            |              |               |
|         |              |            |              | -             |
|         |              |            |              |    protection |
|         |              |            |              |     of        |
|         |              |            |              |     critical  |
|         |              |            |              |               |
|         |              |            |              |    facilities |
|         |              |            |              |     etc       |
+---------+--------------+------------+--------------+---------------+

From looking at this development of a hierarchy of principles he
believed that there was one over-riding principle: ***Resilient
communities are essential.***

Believed that policy advice could come from these principles

-   Before disaster events

-   To prepare for disaster events

-   In a disaster recovery operation

Left us to consider the following thoughts:

-   Is this the right approach?

-   How do you know when to activate these principles?

-   We need to get everything in perspective -- with more emphasis on
    recovery

-   Ethics and values principles (level 1) are likely to remain static
    but tactical (level 3) and implementation principles (level 4) may
    change.

-   Are the principles that are developed, utopian or realistic?

**Perspective Two**

**Terry Jeggle, United Nations International Strategy for Disaster
Reduction**

The focus of this presentation was on shared interests and mutual
efforts.

Jeggle believed we tend to approach disaster management from either the
operational viewpoint or from the policy viewpoint. Both viewpoints are
equally important. He believed that there was also a wide variety of
what people focused on in disaster management (eg. early warning
signals).

He gave the example of the island of Simeulue that was only 100 miles
from the epicentre of the 2004 tsunami event. Yet because of their
knowledge, passed down over the years from previous tsunamis in 1833 and
1907 there were only seven fatalities in the 2004 event[^2].

If we adopt a principles approach to disaster management then locational
and contextual factors need be taken into account. (eg. China is not
Fiji ) Therefore we need to look at it not only from a disaster
management perspective but also from the perspective of the community
mayor, an environmentalist etc.

To illustrate this point he asked a group of students to write down the
first word that came into their mind when the word disaster was
mentioned. Most students immediately thought about an actual disaster
event and it usually had a negative connotation. There was not much
anticipation of what might happen.

Jeggle believes that we need to encourage people to look at disaster
management from a broader perspective and not only from a response
perspective which is often the case. To support this he mentioned that
people in Indonesia were worried about the volcano erupting yet behind
their back an earthquake occurred. We need to focus not only on known
risks but also emerging risks.

Jeggle then outlined the Hyogo Framework for Action 2005 -- 15: Building
the Resilience of Nations and Communities to Disasters[^3].

Three strategic goals were adopted:

-   The integration of disaster risk considerations into sustainable
    development policies, planning and programming at all levels with a
    special emphasis on disaster prevention, mitigation, preparedness
    and vulnerability reduction

-   Development and strengthening of institutions, mechanisms and
    capacities at all levels, in particular at the community level that
    can systematically contribute to building resilience to hazards

-   Systematic incorporation of risk reduction approaches into the
    design and implementation of emergency preparedness, response and
    recovery programmes in the reconstruction of affected communities

On the basis of this Framework he then outlined some priorities for
considering principles.

1.  Governance: ensure disaster risk reduction is a national and local
    priority with strong institutional bases

2.  Risk Identification: identify, assess and monitor disaster risks and
    enhance early warnings

3.  Knowledge: use knowledge, innovation and education to build a
    culture of safety and resilience at all levels

4.  Reducing underlying risk factors: sectoral mainstreaming

5.  Strengthen disaster preparedness: for effective response

To be clear to ourselves we need to factor in the culture, the values of
the society and its application of these values.

**Perspective Three**

**Kenneth Mitchell, Rutgers, State University of New Jersey**

According to Mitchell the evolution of emergency management puts a spin
on the development of emergency management principles. Eg. Western
cultures versus developing cultures.

Disaster management is often very fragmented and decentralised. A lot of
agencies have an emergency management focus and responsibility. Mitchell
believes the system has evolved in a curious way -- from the bottom up.
As each level has failed to respond so the responsibility for getting it
achieved was passed up a level. This was not a good basis to develop a
coherent set of principles.

It is only now that we are trying to develop principles so that we can
pull this fragmented approach together. Mitchell argues that we are now
following ideological principles by saying 'what are the principles that
unite people?'

Mitchell pointed to the history of managing disasters from Civil Defence
days where the primary threat was warfare and nuclear where the emphasis
was on command, control and communication through to human adjustment to
variations in the natural environment (ie. how humans come to terms with
hazards and risks and their experience with natural and technological
hazards).

Mitchell cited FEMA's approach prior to 2000 with its focus on
mitigation but believed terrorism put an end to this focus. Maybe FEMA
is now returning to this mitigation focus.

He points out that the new millennium has brought new threats -- such as
global climate change and economic globalisation process. These are not
hazards that have traditionally been considered in hazard management.

He states that the approaches to disaster management are anywhere on the
continuum from Civil Defence \-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-- through
to \-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\--Green
Sustainability.

***'So can we develop principles?'***

If we can, then we need to clarify the strands. He is ambivalent to the
overemphasis on principles. He believes they cover the question of
surprises and that we really get value in 'learning by doing' -
therefore principles can only go so far.

He then asks 'how can we encourage local level input?' as:

-   At this level there are often part-time employees wearing several
    hats, so they have a lot of issues to deal with

-   We haven't developed the right type of institution at the local
    level

and

-   How do we bridge the ideal and reality at the local level.

**Perspective Four**

**Ken Hewitt, Wilfrid Laurier University, Canada**

Hewitt's presentation focussed not on principles directly but the basis
on which we should be coming to principles.

His presentation focussed on social protection on the basis of assessing
disaster losses according to the possibilities for future disaster
reduction. He outlined four situations of social protection:

-   Potential for significant loss reduction

    -   for general public

    -   for high value or high risk items

-   Losses not preventable but avoidable by:

    -   permanent exclusion

    -   the nomad option

    -   the evacuation or flight option

-   Preventable situations

    -   for the general public

    -   for high value or high risk activities, sites or personnel

-   Non preventable and unavoidable situations

Hewitt also indicated that we need to look at how significant
responsibilities are allocated within communities (referred to Gilbert
White's work on alternative adjustment). Time and history are important.
Some things have to be put in place over decades, others put in place
right away.

He then looked at social vulnerability and institutional risk. If we
look at inquiry conclusions they often point to institutional contexts
that are indifferent and prejudicial to public safety. He believed
inquiries are an important source of what we should do. This is
important because:

-   we live in a world where governments are meant to be transparent
    (this is the consumer sense of the world)

-   how institutions respond is at the core of disaster management

-   we often need to investigate what has happened in the past

-   over and over again we have gone through the process of what to
    mitigate -- it is not new but we don't seem to learn from these
    inquiries

SO PRINCIPLES -- YES; PROTECTIONS -- YES; MITIGATION -- YES

***But*** how these get done relies on institutions. How institutions
intervene is important. We need to address the question of evaluating
and assessing social protection; the question of institutional risk.

Hewitt concluded by saying: '**Why aren't lessons learned? Why the gap?'
Surely identifying and creating safe cultures should be at the core
rather than adopting an approach of blaming after the event.**

After the four perspectives, participants joined break out groups and
with each of the speakers as group facilitators discussed further the
ideas around the development of emergency management principles.

[^1]: Outlined further in his about to be published book *Learning from
    Disaster Recovery: Guidance for Decision Makers*

[^2]: For further information go to
    <http://www.unisdr.org/eng/sasakawa/2005/sk-2005-interviews-eng.htm#4>

[^3]: Adopted at World Conference on Disaster Reduction: 18-22 January
    2005 in Kobe, Hyogo, Japan. Accessible at
    [www.unisdr.org/wcdr](http://www.unisdr.org/wcdr)