Suchergebnisse

This article adopts a comparative socio-legal approach in exploring the relationship between disaster risk and compliance with normative frameworks concerning disaster management. Risk colonisation is the term given to the phenomenon whereby societal risks such as those posed by disasters create further risks, institutional in nature, to disaster management systems themselves. Disaster management systems are exposed to institutional risks, including those that arise from non-compliance with the range of laws and guidelines relating to disaster management developed in recent years. Grounded in exploratory case studies drawn from Indonesia and Ireland, it is suggested that the consequences of this phenomenon is that, in circumstances in which disaster risk is perceived to be high, patterns of compliance with regulatory frameworks are likely to be characterised by recourse to scientific expertise. Blame avoidance and defensive compliance strategies are also likely to occur. Conversely, in circumstances in which disaster risk is perceived to be relatively low, compliance patterns are likely to be ad hoc in nature and allow for significant governmental discretion. The implications of such consequences for the normative underpinning of disaster management are addressed.

Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to explore how culture, including traditions and social structures, can influence resilience and how culturally sensitive relief operations can put affected people and their context at the core of any interventions.


Design/methodology/approach
A case study of the Mt Sinabung volcano area in Indonesia was undertaken. As part of the case study, an analysis of interventions was conducted, which was complemented by semi-structured interviews with Karo cultural experts and humanitarian organisations.


Findings
Culture influences the manner in which the Karo people react to volcano eruptions with varying implications for recovery. In addition, relief organisations which understand people's actions through a cultural lens have better managed to tailor programs with long-term impact, thereby avoiding aid dependency.


Practical implications
Practical examples of disaster management activities that adequately account for the beneficiaries' way of living prior to the eruptions are provided. Aid actors are provided with guidance concerning how to better tailor their activities in line with a cultural lens.


Originality/value
The study provides empirical grounding for claims concerning the role of culture in planning interventions in Indonesia and other similar contexts.

Attempts to consolidate humanitarian actors into a humanitarian system are occurring alongside efforts to generate greater coherence between humanitarian action, development and peace-building. Whether a strengthened humanitarian system can adhere to the humanitarian principles while engaging in post-conflict societal reconstruction is unclear. This would require humanitarian action to address the victimhood mentality when dealing with affected populations and to seek out capacities as well as needs. In so doing the inherent political nature of humanitarian action and the manner in which it is prone to instrumentalization needs to be recognized. This would assist in generating the sensitivity required in order to ensure that humanitarian action would ultimately support rather than undermine reconciliation and the building of democratic institutions.

Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to provide a comprehensive overview of the international legal framework governing urban crises arising from conflict, "natural" and technological disasters.


Design/methodology/approach
The paper deploys legal analysis to the most relevant bodies of international law pertaining to urban crises and systematically outlines the key legal issues arising.


Findings
International humanitarian law (IHL) and international human rights law (IHRL) provide important protections to vulnerable persons in both human-made and "natural" disaster settings. While the two bodies of law do not draw explicit distinctions between urban and rural settings, their various provisions, and indeed their silence on, crucial issues that would enhance legal protection in urban settings merit greater attention.


Research limitations/implications
The paper provides an overview of the sources of international law of most relevance to urban crises. Further research is required into how the urban environment influences their application concretely in urban settings.


Practical implications
In an era when international law is being challenged from many sources and attention is turning to the increasing potential for urban violence and vulnerability, this paper serves to sensitise the disaster management and humanitarian community to the relevance of international legal frameworks to its activities in urban settings.


Originality/value
This paper considers the most salient international legal issues arising during crises and compares and contrasts how the different bodies of international law (IHL and IHRL) address each of the kinds of crises (conflict, "natural" or technological disaster), respectively.

AbstractUnderstanding the nature and scope of existing social capital is essential to building the resilience of people living in vulnerable urban settings. This paper explores the question of how aid organisations can better utilise social capital to build the resilience of communities in slums. It specifically examines the relationship between social capital and urban vulnerability. The study used a mixed-methods approach to understand the diverse perspectives of social capital and uncover relationships that exist between social capital, absorptive and adaptive coping strategies in Kibera and Kawangware slums in Nairobi, Kenya. The findings show that coping is not a community or a societal issue; people living in slums resort to either absorptive or adaptive coping strategies or a combination of both due to the precariousness of livelihoods in such contexts. Measures of bonding, bridging, and linking social capital in slums are significantly associated with adaptive coping strategies. Families that had more dependents, were taking care of ill members or that had no regular source of income were more likely to resort to withdrawing children from school, begging, selling assets, amongst others. Livelihood studies overlook critical aspects of social capital such as bridges and linkages, which are essential for building the transformative capacities of slum dwellers. Therefore, aid actors should focus on social capital if they are to build the capacities of people living in slums. More attention should be given to the role of local organisations and initiatives in establishing bridges and linkages so as not to undermine communities' existing capacities and resource base.

Abstract
While research and innovation collaborations between NGOs and academic organisations can create considerable synergies with positive effects for the humanitarian sector, the inter-sectoral nature of such collaborations can generate challenges due to the varying mandates, objectives and ways of working of the organisations involved. By drawing on the experiences of a 4-year project involving a consortium of academic and NGO partners, this paper outlines three broad and inter-related ethical challenges that such projects can encounter and how they can be practically negotiated. Firstly, how are the knowledge-generation requirements of such projects addressed without engaging in the mere extraction of data from participants? Secondly, how are potential risks to participants arising from their participation balanced with the need to include their voices within the research project? Finally, how are the formal requirements laid down by institutional review committees, primarily within academic organisations, to be adhered to within field contexts in which there are well-established expectations and ways of working on the part of NGO partners and beneficiaries? While these dilemmas are merely illustrative of the potential ethical dilemmas that inter-sectoral collaboration might encounter, the paper highlights that ethical dilemmas ought to be addressed reflexively by all stakeholders in order to facilitate improved collaboration and, ultimately, better quality, more relevant and more ethically informed research.