**Anthropological Contributions**

**to the Study of Disasters**

**Abstract**

This chapter addresses the contributions of anthropology towards the
field of disaster studies and emergency management. Anthropology's
concern with the holistic study of humanity in relation to social,
political, cultural, and economic contexts, as well as the breadth of
its studies done internationally, seem to make it well-positioned to
answer calls from within the field of disaster studies for an "expanded
horizon." This article examines contemporary contributions and
investigations, following the life-cycle of a disaster event, from
pre-disaster vulnerability, conceptions of risk, individual and social
responses and coping strategies, and relief management. It concludes by
providing recommendations for future research.

> Henry, D

2005. Anthropological Contributions to the Study of Disasters. In
      *Disciplines, Disasters*

> *and Emergency Management: The Convergence and Divergence of Concepts,
> Issues*
>
> *and Trends From the Research Literature*. D. McEntire and W.
> Blanchard, eds.
>
> Emittsburg, Maryland: Federal Emergency Management Agency.
>
> [http://training.fema.gov/emiweb/edu/ddemtextbook.asp]{.underline}

-special thanks to the editors, and to Anthony Oliver-Smith, Peter Van
Arsdale, and Linda Whiteford for their helpful comments on earlier
drafts.

Doug Henry, Ph.D.

Dept. of Anthropology

University of North Texas

\(940\) 243-1515

dhenry@scs.unt.edu

Anthropology attempts to engage its subjects holistically and
comparatively, placing its focus on the broader context of human
interactions in contemporary, historical, and prehistorical time, as
well as the interrelationships between cultural, social, political,
economic, and environmental domains. In its approach to studying
disasters, this has meant calling attention to how risks and disasters
both influence and are products of human systems, rather than
representing simply isolated, spontaneous, or unpredictable events.
There is especial concern with how cultural systems (the beliefs,
behaviors, and institutions characteristic of a particular society or
group) figure at the center of that society's disaster vulnerability,
preparedness, mobilization, and prevention. Understanding these cultural
systems, then, figures at the center of understanding both the
contributing causes to disasters as well as the collective responses to
them.[^1] A holistic approach examines the complex interrelationships
between humans, culture, and their environment, from the human actions
that may cause or influence the severity of disaster, to the position of
social vulnerability that defines disaster impact, to the range of
socio-cultural adaptations and responses, including the impact of aid
and the infusion of donor money. The comparative, relativistic approach
of the discipline has often given it a critical stance, privileging
local knowledge and local ways of management, while problematizing the
dominant models of relief.

Given calls within disaster studies for an "expanded horizon" more
inclusive than the current domestic, natural hazards focus, anthropology
seems ideally situated to make a contribution to the field. Its own
broad perspective includes what Dynes (2004) calls "slow-onset"
disasters, public health epidemics, and complex emergencies. Because
anthropologists often work in the developing world, where vulnerability
to disasters is the highest, they have been positioned to comment on
issues like risk, change, management, and assistance. Some of the most
complete reviews of the field have been done by Anthony Oliver-Smith
(see, for instance, his 1996 "Anthropological Research on Hazards and
Disasters," and 1999 *The Angry Earth: Disaster in Anthropological
Perspective* (edited with Susanna Hoffman), which provide much of the
basis and inspiration for this current review); many of the conceptual
categories that follow are his. The chapter is organized to follow
anthropology's contributions to the complete life cycle of disaster,
from issues of vulnerable and perceived risk, to individual and social
responses and coping strategies, to relief and recovery efforts.

**Pre-Disaster Risk and Vulnerability**

Culture influences that some people within the social system are more
vulnerable to disasters than others. Ethnic minorities, disempowered
castes or classes, religious groups, or occupations may live or work in
physical areas that are relatively disaster-prone (Torry 1979, Zaman
1989, Haque and Zaman 1993, Bankoff 2003). For example, the mortality
from the 1976 earthquake in Guatemala so disproportionately impacted the
poor (unable to afford standard construction, and forced to live in
landslide-susceptible ravines and gorges) that the disaster was called a
"classquake" (Blaikie et al. 1994). In addition, cultural ideas about
gender occupations and gender roles may predispose women (and often, by
association, children) to be disproportionately represented among groups
whom disasters strike, or who are most vulnerable to its effects
(Agarwal 1992, Shaw 1992, Fothergill 1996, Bari 1998). Studies of
vulnerability and risk have thus focused largely on environmental and
technological susceptibility, such as at living near waste disposal
sites (Johnston 1994, Pellow 2002), water contamination (Fitchen 1988),
workplace contact with toxic chemicals or dust (Sharp 1968, Michaels
1988, Petterson 1988), and industrial accidents (Wallace 1987).
Pre-disaster inequalities within social relationships have also been
shown to exacerbate tensions and discrimination during times of crisis
or relief (Jackson 2003). Torry (1986), for instance, showed how
pre-disaster religiously sanctioned inequality existing in India
structured the provision of relief during famine in such ways that
reinforced the cultural model of customary discrimination. He notes that
social adjustments during crisis \"are not radical, abnormal breaks with
customary behavior; rather they extend ordinary conventions" (1986:
126). Working with Bangladeshi communities resettled from erosion prone
riverine areas, Haque and Zaman (1993) suggest that relief efforts that
ignore broader cultural institutions like religious and sociopolitical
organization, may do so at their own peril, in that they ignore factors
that influence or limit how communities are able to organize and respond
to their own situation.

In parallel with work in other disciplines, anthropology has sought ways
to call attention to (and alleviate) structural conditions of
predisaster vulnerability that predispose some communities to experience
disaster or that increase the severity of disaster impact. Such
conditions include gender inequality, global inequities, endemic
poverty, racism, a history of colonial exploitation, imbalances of
trade, and underdevelopment. Poor or ethnic minority groups may have
little choice but to live in sub-standard housing on or near unstable
land prone to flooding, drought, disease, or environmental pollution
(Bodley 1982, Johnston 2001). The developing world experiences three
times the disaster-induced death rates of the developed world (UNDRO
1984). Paul Farmer, a medical anthropologist, takes stock of the
profound and spreading social disaster within the poorest countries of
the world that HIV/ AIDS and tuberculosis infection represent (1999,
2004). With millions dead and tens of millions of children left orphaned
in Africa alone, Farmer places the blame for the epidemic squarely on
structural forces: the poverty and racism that heighten vulnerability by
preventing the poor from receiving education and health care access, the
multinational greed that prevents life-prolonging treatment drugs from
reaching the poor, and neo-liberal economic policies that force
governments to slash safety nets and reduce spending on crucial social
services (see also Schoepf et al. 2000).

Research from the African Sahel has shown that economic pressures
associated with colonialism and global trade induced unsustainable
practices that increased the local vulnerability to desertification,
famine, and starvation (Turton 1977, Fagan 1999). Oliver-Smith notes the
"socially created pattern of vulnerability" that Spanish-induced changes
in building materials, design, and settlement patterns induced in Andean
cultures, that contributed to higher mortality during a 1970 earthquake
in Peru (1994). The pressure for economic development, modernization,
and growth through means such as mining, deforestation, urbanization,
and hydroelectric dams, can lead to dramatic environmental degradation,
loss of food security, and increasing disease vectors, thus elevating
vulnerability to natural and infectious hazards (Scudder and Colson
1982, Simonelli 1987, Cernea 1990, Shipton 1990, Hunter 1992, Lerer and
Scudder 1999).

There is also research on how various actors involved in pre-disaster
situations assess and define risk and vulnerability. Anthropologists
have emphasized local models of risk construction, and stressed the
importance of understanding the sociocultural context of judgments and
indigenous linguistic categories and behaviors about what is dangerous
and what is not. They note that public perceptions about risk and
acceptability are shared constructs; therefore, understanding how people
think about and choose between risks must be based on the study of
culturally-informed values as well as their social context of poverty or
power (Wolfe 1988, Cernea 2000). Douglas and Wildavsky (1982) note, for
instance, that scientific ratios that assess levels of risk are
incomplete measures of the human approach to danger, since they
explicitly try to exclude culturally constructed ideas about living "the
good life." Risky habits or dangerous behaviors are conformations to
lifestyles, and thus become evaluated within other socially and
culturally evaluated phenomenon. Food, money, or lifestyle may outweigh
perceived vulnerability. People live in Los Angeles, for example, not
because they like breathing smog, but to take advantage of job
opportunities, or because they value natural beauty, a warm climate,
etc. Altering risk selection and risk perception, then, depends on
changing the social order. From the point of view of sociology, Mileti
(1999) similarly argues that any shift in vulnerability-preparedness
must include a shift in cultural premises that privilege technological
solutions, consumerism, and short-term, non-sustainable development.  He
notes that in the U.S., centralized attempts to guard against natural
disasters, especially those that employ technological means to control
nature, may ultimately create a false sense of security that can
exacerbate the risk of even more damage occurring. For instance, dams
and levees meant to protect communities from flooding along the
Mississippi River basin actually encouraged denser settlement patterns
and industrial development in flood-prone areas, which inflicted much
greater losses during a large flood that caused the levees to fail.
Paine (2002), in writing about Israeli citizen responses to violence
from the Palestinian uprising, notes that consciousness of risk can
actually be socially negated. Particularly for Zionist Israelis, the
acceptance of religious identity and collective mission supersedes any
rational calculation of vulnerability. Finally, Stephens (2002) writes
how political culture can shape risk assessment. In Europe in the years
following the Chernobyl disaster, risk assessment has been effectively
delegated away from individual or personal level to the realm of
scientific "authoritative experts." Stephens' work shows the pressure
among these experts to both inform an anxious public about the levels of
risk surrounding nuclear energy, nuclear accidents, and radiation
danger, and simultaneously assuage the public that everything is
"normal" and "under control."

**Responses to Disaster**

*Individual and Organizational Responses*

As Oliver-Smith notes, hazards and disasters challenge the structure and
organization of society. Much anthropology, therefore, examines the
behaviors of individual actors and groups within the events surrounding
a disaster. The anthropology of disaster response has focused on changes
occurring within cultural institutions like religion, ritual, economic
organization, and politics, especially concerning the relative degrees
of local cooperation or conflict, the ability of local institutions to
mitigate the impact of a disaster, and the differential capabilities of
response due to ethnicity, gender, age, and socioeconomic status (Das
1997). Pannell (1999), for instance, notes that inland resettlement of a
coastal community because of volcanic activity involved dramatic and
destabilizing changes in subsistence, organization, and identity.
Research has also focused on how vulnerable populations variously
respond to both the crisis and the provision of aid, in particular the
aged (Guillette 1993), women (Vaughan 1987, Shaw 1992, Alexander 1995,
Bari 1998), and children (Gordon et al. 1996, Tobin and Whiteford 2001,
Shepler 2003). Each of these populations may have different coping
mechanisms, different vulnerabilities, and different capabilities
(Anderson 1994, Nordstrom 1998, Skelton 1999). Research has also focused
on the interactions and interrelationships between donors, providers and
recipients of aid (Oliver-Smith 1979).

With the rise in occurrence and severity of technological disasters such
as oil spills and chemical explosions have come anthropological studies
of community and corporate responses. Research into the Exxon-Valdez
Alaska oil spill uncovered how communities recover from the stress and
impact of the spill. Some of these have shown that disasters can
stimulate a range of social responses, from initial anger and denial to
social integration and cohesiveness, as new groups form to initiate
bargaining for responsibility and obligation (Button 1992). Loughlin's
work on responses to the Bhopal, India, chemical explosion shows how
corporate and community definitions as to disaster, culpability, and
accountability can be at odds, and that disasters may stimulate new
forms of local activism and social consciousness (Loughlin 1996). Such
research provides grounding for the concept of "environmental justice"
(Johnson 1994), which attempts to define rights for those communities
whose subsistence is primarily dependent on an ecological relationship
with their surrounding natural resources.

Though disaster-literature typically focuses on the population-level,
disaster-related trauma may have individual effects that become
expressed in culturally informed ways, in response to fire (Maida et al.
1989), earthquake (Bode 1989, Oliver-Smith 1992), technological disaster
(Palinkas et al. 1993), or complex emergencies (Jenkins 1996, Caruth
1996, Young 1997, Henry 2000a). Anthropologists have come to use the
analytical term "embodiment" to focus on the complex meanings of
disaster-related trauma that become manifest in individuals, as the
lived experiences of disaster, and the creative ways that survivors use
to comprehend the trauma done to their lives, and attempt to move on
(Kleinman et al. 1997, Green 1999, Anderson 2004, Scheper-Hughes and
Bourgois 2004). Henry, for instance, notes how *haypatensi* (from the
English medical condition "hypertension") evolved in the war-torn areas
of Sierra Leone as a new kind of local sickness experienced by refugees
and internally displaced persons in response to their experiences of
violence, displacement, and the provision of relief aid (Henry 2000b).
Cathy Caruth (1996) notes that when traumatic experience is remembered,
a "historical narrative" is created in which the events become
restructured and resituated in ways that help the survivors understand
and make sense of what happened, and move forward (see also Malkki
1990). The analyses of trauma narratives have been recognized as
valuable in helping illuminate how people come to make sense of the
violence done within disaster (Poniatowska 1995, Jenkins 1996, Coker
2004). As Coker points out, the references within that narrative need
not be straightforward, but become locally understood and expressed
indirectly in culturally defined idioms (somatization, a new kind of
sickness, Divine punishment, supernatural wrath, spirit possession,
etc.).

Anthropologists have often been critical of the dominant Western
classification-diagnoses "PTSD," or Post-Traumatic-Stress-Disorder,
especially its claim to represent universal "human" responses to
extremely traumatic situations. They trace the diagnosis through the
historical construction of "trauma," especially in its transformations
by 19^th^ and 20^th^ century scientists, and the study of
war-traumatized WWII soldiers and Vietnam veterans (Hermann 1992, Young
1997, Petty and Bracken 1998). Bracken notes that PTSD was created
through Western categories, and that the therapy it entails is shaped by
Western ideas of cognitivism, in which trauma is located as an event
inside a person's head, rather than representing a social phenomenon,
where recovery might be bound up with the recovery of the wider
community. Instead, in line with the Western model, children and adults
are universally encouraged to talk about traumatic experiences, or draw,
paint, or use storytelling, in effect provoking them to relive the
trauma. Not surprisingly, anthropologists have been critical of this
kind of approach; it conflicts with the holistic and relativistic
approaches of anthropology described above---"Talking cures" or
counseling that ignores other family or community members may be
cross-culturally inappropriate, especially in other parts of the world,
where conceptions of individuality and person may be much more connected
to the social context than in the Western world (Young 1995, Brett
1996). Parker (1992) further notes that any implication that traumatic
disaster is "temporary" ignores the fact that many people live with
chronic insecurity, economic frailty, and extended states of trauma.

*Responsive Belief Systems and Coping Strategies*

Since the beginning of the discipline, anthropologists have been
interested in how people draw upon and alter their belief systems in
efforts to come to terms with events of catastrophic change, violence,
loss, resettlement, and even humanitarian relief (Lindstrom 1993, Maida
1996). These events can involve changes in social institutions like
religious beliefs or customs (Stewart and Harding 1999), social
organization (Colson 1973, Oliver-Smith 1977), attitudes and values
(Bode 1977, Oliver-Smith 1992), even marriage institutions (Loizos
1977).

Anthropologists have shown some of the adaptive coping strategies that
even relatively isolated world populations have traditionally used to
respond and cope with disasters from the environment, such as flood,
drought, conflict, earthquake, volcanic explosion, and disease (Turton
1977, Torry 1978a, Zaman 1989, Tobin and Whiteford 2002). Archaeology,
for instance, has used the material record to provide long-term depth
for understanding the human-environment relationship in both historical
and pre-historical time. This has involved using flora, fauna, and
material remains to examine the relationship between contextual
variables like the magnitude or speed of a disaster with social
variables such as population density, wealth distribution, and political
complexity, in order to assess how disasters have impacted human
response and social adaptation over time (McGuire et al. 2000, Bawden
and Reycraft 2001). Some of the work here notes how disasters can
instigate cultural evolution (Minnis 1985, Mosely and Richardson 1992);
others note the disastrous consequences of unsustainable environmental
practices that human behavior can cause (Fagan 1999, Redman 1999, Dods
2002). In contemporary time, Elizabeth Colson has pointed out the
creative coping mechanisms that can occur within social systems as a
result of the upheaval of forced relocation, such as flexible forms of
social organization, familial obligations, occupations, and belief
systems (1973, 2003). Monica Wilson notes how the cultural norms of
hospitality in southern Africa enabled shipwrecked explorers and traders
to be welcomed and integrated into the social order of local communities
(1979). Davis echoes this, noting that the suffering involved in
traumatic experience is social---"the experience of war, famine, and
plague is continuous with ordinary social experience; people place it in
social memory and incorporate it with their accumulated culture (1992:
152). For Davis, suffering results not so much from a "breakdown" in the
proper functioning of the social order, but rather is itself a painful
part of the social organization. This includes the culturally diverse
ways that people mourn, and how they draw upon culturally and
religiously defined symbols to find strength (Bode 1989, Hoffman 1995).

In some areas of the world, people have long had to deal with social
disruption, such as areas in the African Sahel, where drought, famine,
and political insecurity have become somewhat common, if not always
anticipated, events. In Sudan, for example, Van Arsdale (1989) coins the
term "adaptive flux**"** to refer to the indigenous self-help tactics
and long-term coping strategies that have evolved to enable people to
survive under fluctuating, harsh, and erratic conditions in what is a
socio-economically and geographically peripheral area. People may
activate migration networks that send some family members to urban
areas, farmers may enact systems of crop rotations or sharing of draft
animals to increase the chance of a successful harvest, or they may rely
on grass-roots political councils to mobilize food resources or security
during scarcity or political instability. In Ethiopia, for example,
Hailu et al. (1994) note that these kind of local council decisions were
able to mobilize 6,000 peasants to build a dry-weather road to eastern
Sudan in a short time. This later enabled relief-assistance to reach the
area during famine.

Adaptive strategies can, however, become strained under the larger-scale
of vulnerability that has frequently accompanied the transformations
inflicted on indigenous societies since Western contact, colonialism,
industrialization, and incorporation into the world market. Already
mentioned was how British colonialism and economic pressures in the East
African Sahel eroded (and in some cases, outlawed) preexisting
indigenous methods of drought survival, and increased the local
vulnerability to desertification, famine, and starvation (Turton 1977,
Fagan 1999).

*Responses Within Political Organization*

Anthropologists have noted how disasters can alter political
organizations and power relations between individuals, the state, and
international actors. Disasters may provide a kind of structuring idiom
that allows people to more clearly apprehend their own political
situation and their own position of power (or marginality) relative to
that of the state (Chairetakis 1991, Button 1992). Chairetakis notes
that where states or political parties are able to exploit the situation
by being seen as a major player in relief, relief efforts can bolster
the dominant political interests of those already in power (see also
Blaikie et al. 1994). Davis, writing about the consequences of
earthquake and tsunami in Alaska, notes that disaster assistance
functioned to increase the integration of native groups into the state
(Davis 1986). Alternately, disaster and relief can stimulate the
development of subaltern means, identities, or interests. Robinson et
al. (1986), for instance, writing about local responses following the
1985 Mexico City Earthquake, note how neighborhood and student
organizations recovering from the quake felt empowered to mobilize and
demand more accountability from the political party in power.

*Responses Within Economic Systems*

Anthropologists have always been interested in the material and economic
exchange of peoples, especially in terms of production, distribution,
consumption, the allocation of scarce resources, and the cultural rules
for the distribution of commodities. Because disasters and disaster
relief can so dramatically impact material subsistence and exchange,
anthropologists have looked at the changes that disasters can bring to
economic systems and related mechanisms like employment, sharing,
egalitarianism, and morality (Dirks 1980). Torry, for example, studying
Hindu responses to famine, notes that social inequalities situated
within caste or other sanctioned structures can produce marked
inequalities in access to resources, and the unequal distribution of
relief items (Torry 1986). Oliver-Smith, writing about immediate
responses to avalanche and earthquake in Peru, notes that previously
existing stratifications like class and ethnicity can temporarily
disappear in a short-lived wave of altruism. Once national and
international aid appears, however, old divisions can reemerge, and
conflicts over access to resources begin again (1979, 1992).

**Providing Relief: Development and Power**

As mentioned above, anthropology has sought ways to alleviate the
structural conditions of predisaster vulnerability that predispose
individuals, groups, or societies to experience disaster, or that
increase the severity of disaster's impact. Targeting these structural
conditions, then, has often involved a search for ways to incorporate
the goals and mechanisms of "sustainable development" into the paradigm
of "relief" (Cuny 1983, Kibreab 1987, Slim and Mitchell 1992, Zetter
2003, Anderson and Woodrow 1998). The relief paradigm is criticized for
being externally managed and non-participatory, or for failing to
recognize and affirm local institutions or skills with which communities
might be involved in the management of their own disasters. Critics note
the singular tendency of the relief model to implement top-down
strategies which preclude situational flexibility or genuine local
participation, or for biases which pathologize the victims or survivors
and encourage aggressive, external interventions, or for the
"restricting logic" that relief bureaucracies impose on the recipients
of aid, thus creating dependent, helpless, powerless populations
(Harrell-Bond 1993, Adams and Bradbury 1995, De Waal 1997, Platt 2000).
They posit that a more developmental approach is ultimately more
beneficial in helping prevent future disasters, in that development is
more likely to target the structural forces attributed to be at the root
causes of vulnerability. Developmentalists assert that emergency relief
should be temporary, and that any aid should be quickly followed by
rehabilitation, focusing on "capacity building" and "supporting local
structures" (see Boutros-Ghali 1992). Critics of this counter that these
words can be merely excuses for reducing food and medical entitlements,
which then shift the burden to local communities without properly
assessing their capacities to manage it (Macrae et al. 1997, Bradbury
1998, Macrae 1998).

The international system of relief can dramatically impact previously
remote or marginal areas, and create new and previously inconceivable
kinds of employment, education, opportunity, even aspirations, for
people. As noted, however, new opportunities tend to fall along
preexisting restrictions of gender roles and expectations, class,
nationality, or religion (Ferguson and Byrne 1994, Anderson and Woodrow
1998, Sommers 2001, Shepler 2002), and can even result in heightened
tension or conflict (Jackson 2003). As mentioned above, the comparative
and relativistic stance of the discipline has given it an often critical
stance towards dominant Western models of relief, often giving voice
instead to local knowledge and local ways of management (Harrell-Bond
1993, De Waal 1997). Others have analyzed the media, and how those
affected by disaster are portrayed in popular print. This includes a
critique of the media for appropriating images and stories of others'
experiences of pain and suffering as a commodity to be bought, sold,
manipulated, or marketed in order to attract more donations (Feldman
1995, Kleinman and Kleinman 1997, Gourevitch 1998).

Some have directly confronted the structural imbalances embedded in the
relationships between refugees and the humanitarian community. This
calls attention to the fact that the very field of "emergency
management" often involves an a priori assumption that local people are
in need of external managers, and are unable to provide for themselves
(Torry 1978b, see also Mileti 1999). Though not an anthropologist, Platt
(2000) argues that U.S. disaster policy since 1950 has supplanted moral
and community concern with government subsidies and
financially-expressed compassion that fosters co-dependency, effectively
providing disincentives to local governments in their own attempts to
create disaster-resistant communities. Ino Rossi, in studying the
long-term reconstruction following an earthquake in Italy, notes that
local priorities can be overlooked when they differ from those of
donors, and relief agents, and governments (Rossi 1993). The control of
information by donors may be linked to anxiety, frustration, and
feelings of powerlessness among recipients (Button 1995, Henry 2000a).
Malkki, in her work with Rwandan refugees in the Congo, notes that
humanitarian knowledge is discursively powerful, and may operate to
silence local agendas that run contrary to its own (1996). The
recipients of aid are not completely powerless, however; Henry (2002)
notes how refugees living in remote, marginal, border areas learned to
adapt to the system providing relief aid by interchanging identities
between "citizens" and "displaced" in order to maximize benefits and
empower themselves on an international stage dominated by foreign relief
efforts.

Because one of the most common social reactions to a crisis is flight,
problems associated with the management of post disaster population
upheaval and resettlement have been examined in considerable detail. One
avenue of productive exploration has been with populations fleeing
complex emergencies, obtaining shelter in camps set up for refugees and
internally displaced people (IDPs) (Colson 2003); this includes the
effects of camp policies on the displaced themselves. A growing body of
research questions the international community's motivations in
persistently encouraging the placement of refugees in separate,
demarcated camps (Harrell-Bond 1986, 1994, Van Damme 1995), as opposed
to self-settlement. Infectious disease rates may be higher in camps,
despite aggressive, centralized public health interventions; nutritional
problems may be higher, especially where there is no individual access
to means of subsistence, and environmental damage is greater. Morbidity
and mortality may be underreported, as camp dwellers have an interest in
concealing any drop in their numbers in order to maintain relief-supply
entitlements. There may be further "invisible" damages from introducing
a foreign aid system, which undermines local values of sharing,
cooperation, or hospitality, that hold society together. Yet despite
this research, local and international agencies, usually under UN
auspices, use relief supplies to encourage the settlement of displaced
people into camps, with the rationale that centralized groups of
displaced people are easier to distinguish from the general population
and manage.

Starting from Foucault's *Discipline and Punish* (1979), Malkki notes
how camps for displaced people can be seen as discrete loci of
asymmetric power---set apart, clearly bounded, and with formalized,
hierarchical structures. Almost as in a hospital, mobility in the camps
may be restricted by numerous identification stations and check points.
The "sick" are the displaced, uncertain of the necessary course of
events to get them back to a desired state, at the mercy of the
authoritative knowledge of camp administrators, and secure in their
residence only by maintaining a demonstration of helplessness (Hitchcox
1990, Malkki 1995, Muecke 1992). Harrell-Bond (1986, 1993), Mazur
(1988), and Kibreab (1993) document how the paradigms in use by the
UNHCR tend to characterize the displaced as "helpless," despite abundant
evidence to the contrary. This bureaucratic conceptualization may be
reinforced by an ideological belief that refugees lack the motivation or
capacity to work out solutions for their own self-sufficiency (Van
Arsdale 1993, Gibbs 1994). Such characterization has severe implications
for how refugees are treated: camp authorities may react negatively when
refugees demonstrate their own competence, as personal initiative is
seen as interfering with the "smooth functioning" of the camps (Williams
1990). Camps may thus impose a kind of "restricting logic" on its
members; powerless to take charge of events affecting their lives, the
displaced often become dependent on aid agencies for their basic
subsistence (Marchal 1987).

The history of the modern system of international humanitarian relief
has received recent attention, as has the ambivalent nature of its entry
into disaster affected areas (Crew 1998, Middleton and O'Keefe 1998). De
Waal (1993, 1997), for example, in his critique of the self-serving
nature of humanitarian interventions in Africa and Asia, implicates the
"relief industry" as perpetuating (and exacerbating) the very famines
and conflict they purportedly try to alleviate (see also Jackson 2003).
Also noted is the inappropriateness of some aid, especially food relief.
Henry (2000a) notes that supplying cornmeal and boxed breakfast cereal
to West African refugees whose staple is rice may have satisfied
regional political and economic pressures within the World Food Program,
but did little to alleviate local hunger. Having no idea how to prepare
cornmeal into recognizable "food," Sierra Leonean refugees were forced
to sell the cornmeal to local traders in exchange for bags of rice.
Unfortunately, this was a bad deal for those in need, as the poor
exchange rate in a cash-poor environment meant worsened malnutrition and
hunger. Finally, a growing literature looks at the impact of disaster
resettlement on host country populations. Gebre (2003) notes that while
displaced populations receive aid, research coverage, and policy
attention, those hosting the displaced can themselves undergo extreme
strain and upheaval, though their plight remains largely unnoticed.
Similarly, Leach (1992) and Henry (2002) note that relief efforts for
Liberian and Sierra Leonean refugees could upset and sour traditionally
cordial host-guest and extended family relationships and obligations.

**Assessment**

In summary, anthropology offers the field of disaster studies broad
comparative, contextual, and cross-cultural perspectives, particularly
from its extensive work in the developing world. Its holistic approach
frames disasters within their social, cultural, political, economic, and
environmental relationships, from the human behaviors that can cause or
influence the severity of disaster, to culturally informed adaptations
and responses, to the relative social vulnerabilities that mitigate or
magnify a disaster's impact.

The anthropology of disasters works under the assumption that those
suffering under crisis are not empty vessels stripped bare of their
cultural make-up; on the contrary, cultural institutions figure at the
center of a society's disaster vulnerability, preparedness,
mobilization, and prevention. It follows then, that disaster
preparedness as well as relief and reconstruction aid could be more
appropriate, efficient, and economical if an understanding of the
experiences and perspectives of local communities and institutions were
taken into account. This includes understanding the larger social and
organizational cultures that may interfere with practices of
sustainable, long-term development. Given the top-down biases of
emergency relief, anthropology needs to continue to seek practical ways
to incorporate local technical knowledge, insight, skills, desires, and
needs into the management of disaster situations, so that local people
and institutions might be affirmed in identifying problems and offering
solutions towards the management of their own situation, and that local
capacities may be strengthened to resist future emergencies. Morren
(1983), for instance, notes that Kalahari Bushmen in Africa, on the
front lines of disaster as first responders to drought, can be
remarkably effective in limiting loss and facilitating relief (see also
Torry 1988).

In addition, more ethnographic research is needed on the organizational
cultures and constraints of relief agencies themselves, along the lines
of Kent's *Anatomy of Disaster Relief* (1987). This should move beyond
the merely critical, to offer practical solutions as to how to address
the gap between research and practice, perhaps focusing on how
bureaucratic barriers might be transcended in order to encourage
situational flexibility and generate genuine grass-roots participation.
This should include the moral, social, political, and economic values
that the recipients of aid attach to the items being provided in relief
(Prendergast 1996).

Finally, there are methodological concerns that need to be addressed.
More critical research is needed into how social scientists can
professionally yet ethically conduct research during and in the midst of
disasters. The professional concerns include the identification of
methodological biases, such that our work can remain both academically
sound and yet policy relevant. There are also ethical concerns that
arise from the researcher's position of relative privilege and power
(Nordstrom and Robben 1995, Greenhouse et al. 2002, Jacobsen and Landau
2003). This is particularly true for international disasters that occur
in developing countries, whose people experience more extreme forms of
vulnerability and stress. Through its concern for local sensitivities,
anthropology needs to ask how it may better structure questions and
better seek information in ways that inflict the least harm from people
under situations of severe duress.

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