Nach dem Hochwasser ist vor dem Hochwasser: Eine Analyse zur Rationalität politischer Entscheidungsprozesse ; (Deutschland und Vietnam im späten 20. Jahrhundert) ; Preparing for the next Flood: An Analysis on Rationality of Political Decision Making ; (Germany and Vietnam in the late 20th Century)
How to assess Disaster Responds on Flood Events during the 20th Century – a conceptional framework and its application in Vietnam and Germany A comparison of disaster responds on flood events during the late 20th century in Vietnam and Germany promises to provide an insight on disaster responds from a normative perspective. The fear of natural disasters leads to a comprehensive program of sciences and politics to apply security technologies on a global scale. Historical Environmental Science traces the question whether societies learn from natural disasters. I aim to contribute to the question: Was the handling of flood events rational? The normative framework I base my research on to assess the physical and psychological costs reflects a multidimensional structure of welfare economics as well as the application of the ethnical theory of social subjectivism. The basic premise of the ethnical theory is marked by the transformable character of all evaluative statements into states about all individual preferences. As a baseline the ethnical theory of social subjectivism functions to focus on all preferences by natural persons. Herein, institutions are assumed outcomes of preferences aiming to strategically solve specific challenges. Human beings are always oriented to solve problems. While reducing this economical cost is imperative, the question remains whether this cost should be reduced. However, limited resources force decision makers to assess which problems may be solved and which not. In this context it may be of benefit and the most rational to not realize prevention measurements, as the linked opportunity costs end up being too high. In order to evaluate a response in this normative framework one has to compare the social benefits of this response with the linked social cost. However, due to missing historical data on social benefits and cost, such cost-benefit analysis cannot be performed. Therefore I developed a concept following Schnädelbach's theory of interpersonal communication as a basis of rationality which solves these uncertainties and allows a normative assessment of disaster responds on flood events. The concept uses an indirect approach and is based on accessible information.