Production of Disaster and Recovery in Post-Earthquake Haiti

Disaster Industrial Complex

Juliana Svistova, Loretta Pyles

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2018
• Print ISBN: 9781138234932
• eBook ISBN: 9781315306018
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Global Development Studies
• Index: Social Sciences

Natural disasters have long been seen as naturally generated events, but as scientific, technological, and social knowledge of disasters has become more sophisticated, the part that people and systems play in disaster events has become more apparent. Production of Disaster and Recovery in Post-Earthquake Haiti demonstrates how social processes impact disasters as they unfold, through the distribution of power and resources, the use of discourses and images of disaster, and the economic and social systems and relations which underlie affected communities. The authors show how these processes played out in post-earthquake Haiti to set in motion the mechanics of the disaster industrial complex to (re)produce disasters and recovery rather than bring sustainable change.

The book reveals that disaster and recovery rhetoric helped create fertile conditions for neoliberal disaster governance, militarized and digital humanitarianism, non-profiteering, and disaster opportunism to flourish while further disenfranchising marginalized populations. However, the Haiti earthquake, as is the case with all disaster sites, was ripe with mutual aid, community building, and collective action, all of which further local resilience. The authors seek to re-construct dominant discourses, policies, and practices to advance equitable, participatory partnerships with local community actors and propose a praxis for a people's recovery as an action-oriented framework for resisting the transnational disaster industrial machinery. The authors argue for new synergies in policymaking and program development that can respond to emergencies and plan for true long-term, sustainable development after disasters that focuses as much on humans and the natural world as it does on economic progress.

Production of Disaster and Recovery in Post-Earthquake Haiti will be of great interest to students and scholars of disaster studies, humanitarian studies, development studies, Haitian studies, geography and environmental studies, as well as to non-governmental organizations, humanitarians, and policymakers.

1 Discursive (re)production of disaster and recovery

Juliana Svistova and Loretta Pyles

Soon after the earthquake, mainstream news coverage of the disaster reproduced long-standing narratives and stereotypes about Haitians. Indeed, the representations of Haiti that dominated the airwaves in the aftermath of the January 12 quake could virtually be traced back to those popular in the 19th century, especially after the Haitian Revolution, as well as to the 20th century during and after the U.S. occupation of 1915–34. Understanding the continuities of these narratives and their meaning matter now more than ever. The day when Haitians as a people and Haiti as a symbol are no longer representatives of or synonymous with poverty, backwardness, and evil is still yet to come.

(Gina Ulysee, 2010, p. 37)

For many people in the Global North, their understanding of Haiti can be encapsulated by the commonly proffered moniker, “poorest country in the Western Hemisphere.” The epigraph of this chapter captures the idea that not unlike sub-Saharan African countries, this frame has been informed by images, stories, and memes of hungry or begging Black children, AIDS victims, corrupt leaders, coups, and violent or helpless citizens. Bankoff (2001) has noted the pattern of an essentialized, reductionist construction of the Global South as “disease-ridden, poverty-stricken and disaster-prone” (p. 27) and its dwellers as forever marked by “powerlessness, passivity, ignorance, hunger, illiteracy, neediness, oppression and inertia” (p. 23). Similar essentialist monumentalizing of Haiti has occurred throughout history and again after the 2010 earthquake, and, as the author of the epigraph argues, the exposition of these deep frames and perpetuated narratives is a critical and urgent matter.

In this opening chapter, we define and theorize the process of socially (re)producing disasters by means of discourse operations. We begin this chapter by explaining how narratives and images produce post-disaster realities connecting discourses to policy and practice and their relevance to individual experiences and outcomes. We offer a visual graphic of the social (re)production of disasters that reveals the interplay between the discourse production of diverse communities of discourse; the social construction and constitution of disaster recovery; and ultimately, their manifestations in the lives of disaster survivors. Similar to the epigraph’s author, we argue and show that discourses of disaster in the developing world, including Haiti, are not simply about natural disasters. Indeed, the image of disaster is constructed through other frames that have been previously circulated, such as extreme poverty or weak governmental institutions (e.g. Balaji, 2011; Bankoff, 2001; Potter, 2009). As well, we discuss contested discourses of disaster and recovery, including the dominant frames of “new Haiti” and “building back better.” We analyze the different perspectives on these frames, identifying the social and political agendas underlying these discourses and unveiling their divergent meanings, assumptions, and implications (Fan, 2013).

We foreshadow the ways that the various social constructions, particularly those that dominate the (re)production of recovery, contribute to particular outcomes, including disaster capitalism. Throughout the chapter, we suggest that some of these constructions and discourses have a direct and explicit link with action orientations, while others serve as rhetorical facades to rationalize and legitimize practices that do not directly correspond to these constructions and discourses. We close this chapter by discussing the potential implications of these contested discourses and discursive ambiguities on the workings of disaster industrial machinery and the promise of a new and better sustainable disaster recovery.

Discourses and social production of post-disaster realities

This study builds on the constructivist paradigm that acknowledges multiple social realities and the socially constructed nature of knowledge production (see Appendix). From the social constructivist framework emerge two key mechanisms for constructing the social world. First, words have power – social realities and structures are created through words. Second, words, language, and discourses matter to how humans perceive and interpret the world around them and consequently act upon it. What one thinks, says, and does not only feeds back into and reinforces social reality; it also creates, maintains, and reproduces it. These ideas are fundamental to the (re)production of disaster and recovery argument that we invoke throughout this book.

Reality is socially constructed when meaning becomes ascribed to, and further serves to interpret, events and groups of people, rationalizing and legitimizing respective (in)action orientations (Schneider & Ingram, 1993). Understanding discourse as a social practice, Berger and Luckman (1967) proposed that it serves as a means of knowledge development and transmission and maintenance of social relations, as well as a means for it to become socially established as reality. Common sense knowledge and facts become such by human agreement because it is only through this fabric of meanings that the complexity of social reality can become manageable and societies can exist. Language creates institutional facts and constitutes institutional reality, reinforcing power relations in bodies, minds, and institutions (Foucault, 1997; Searle, 1995).

Similarly, we suggest that the post-disaster realities and action orientations in the post-earthquake Haiti context were, in part, shaped by the words and discourses circulated and the images put forth producing new and reproducing old ideas of disaster, recovery, and affected groups. For example, the use of victimhood language in relation to Haitians (e.g. “languishing” victims) in the aftermath of the earthquake exemplifies such a (re)production of “facts” and establishment of certain patterns and relations that legitimize external interventions of foreigners, experts, and profiteers.

Moreover, the socially constructed and constituted nature of human reality may serve as a source of oppression or liberation (Fairclough, 1995, 2003; Schneider & Ingram, 1993). Social constructionism affirms human subjectivity and the power humans have to de-construct oppressive constructed reality. Although disasters are historically produced and deeply entrenched, reality is not absolute and is subject to change and manipulation; since it was constructed (created through ideas, beliefs and meaning) and constituted (legitimized, normalized and institutionalized), it can also be de-and re-constructed and de- and re-constituted, leading one from conforming to reforming and transforming reality. In part, such is the intention of this book as it relates to post-earthquake realities in Haiti and other similar contexts.

Thus, it is essential to understand how processes of discourse (re)production and social construction function in post-disaster contexts and how they play out in disaster recovery. These processes have been widely studied in the media. There is a wealth of scholarship that links public media attention with public knowledge, opinion, attitudes, perceptions, behaviors, and various forms of civic engagement (McCombs et al., 2011; Pantti, Wahl-Jorgensen, & Cottle, 2012; Robinson, 2002). The link between media coverage and broader political action has become known as the “CNN effect,” a concept that denotes that media is able to influence political decisions (Robinson, 2002). In disaster settings, for example, the media tends to portray disaster-affected places and people as chaotic and violent, which is linked to the use of military forces to “maintain order” in humanitarian relief efforts.

In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, Garfield (2007) made connections between news accounts from print and electronic media during the first week following Katrina and policymaking. She argued that because of media portrayals and social construction of Black survivors as anti-social and deviant (“dangerous looters,” “gun-toting killers,” “rapists,” “out-of-control crazed mob,” “marauding thugs”), decisions of government officials resulted in justifying the increased use of militaristic response that prioritized maintaining social order over humanitarian efforts. She suggests that media portrayals constructed a dichotomous racialized imagery of good–bad citizens and, as a result, prescribed different ways in which they needed to be treated. We observed a similar pattern in our research on the Haiti earthquake.

Cox, Long, Jones, and Handler (2008) sought to uncover disaster recovery discourses as postulated by the local Canadian print news media following a devastating forest fire. They analyzed 250 news articles using content analysis and discourse analysis with special attention to thematic patterns and textual silences. The authors identified two prevalent discourses of recovery within the data. They suggest that neoliberal discourse becomes apparent through such dominating narratives as economic-material aspects of loss and recovery, constructions of a worthy citizen as good consumer, and celebrating the contributions of experts and expertise. The discourse regarding human suffering, which they classified as “sequestering of suffering,” unravels around psychological functionalism and renders emotions invisible (e.g. avoiding or hiding emotions, returning to normalcy through productivity, and “erasing” the most affected community from the reporting accounts). They found that certain discursive strategies; subject positions; and evocative, emotional, and collective language were employed to create dominant recovery discourses. Such discourses, the authors concluded, serve to homogenize and normalize cultural assumptions about recovery and connect them to the potential well-being of survivors. They speculated that normalization of the recovery process can create a stigma if victims do not conform; result in adoption of cognitive avoidance strategies (traditionally associated with poorer health); and, through excessive reliance on outside expertise, hinder empowerment and local community leadership.

In the context of post-earthquake Haiti, through the investigation of various sources of data, Hartwig (2010) laid out a comprehensive analysis and deconstruction of the dominant discourses of rebuilding in post-earthquake Haiti. In her analysis of outsider discourses of redevelopment, she scrutinized the way such dominant rationalities were transformed into interventions. She identified three examples of such actions obscured by dominant discourse. First, she revealed the discourse of benevolence and humanitarianism promoted by the international community and proposed that it served to justify and legitimize their involvement. Furthermore, she suggested that “securitizing” and militarizing the post-earthquake situation under the guise of safety and security for Haitians in actuality functioned to extend the dominance and control of the international community. Finally, international actor discourses of economic reform, she contended, furthered neoliberal motives and created discursive space for implementing neoliberal policies.

The reviewed studies indicate that by enacting perceptions, attitudes, and behaviors through meanings (values, beliefs, and feelings), discourses construct and constitute post-disaster reality. Therefore, we understand discourses as political forces because they carry consequences and therefore warrant critical scrutiny. Thus, in this study, we have drawn from multiple sources of data – non-governmental organization (NGO) documents from Oxfam and the International Federation of the Red Cross; policy documents produced by the government of Haiti (and the World Bank) – Post-Disaster Needs Assessment (PDNA) and Action Plan; U.S. government policy documents, including The Congressional Record and the U.S. Government Strategy (USG Strategy) in Haiti; newspaper articles from the Miami Herald and The New York Times; and notes from our field work in post-earthquake Haiti (see Appendix) – all representing diverse discourse communities. Designed to deconstruct, problematize, and question social (re)production and prevailing discourses of disaster and recovery, this study seeks to explore social relations and structures of power in post-earthquake Haiti recovery through identifying dominant groups, ruling ideas, and the promotion of dominant ways of thinking and acting with regard to the disaster event, disaster-affected individuals, and disaster recovery. In short, with an inherent assumption that power and dominance are at work in all social processes, we are interested in which and whose ideas or interests undergird the processes of post-earthquake relief and recovery that unfolded in Haiti.

Clearly, a disaster is not solely an outcome of social (re)production; there is always a natural hazard, such as a hurricane, landslide, earthquake, fire, or tsunami. In Chapter 2, we acknowledge both natural and structural forces at play in disasters and how a combination of these forces played out in Haiti through history to produce vulnerability and risk and ultimately how this risk, when faced with the natural hazard, produced the disaster of a tragic magnitude. Natural causes and explanations notwithstanding, in this book, our focus is on the social processes and discursive practices that frame the disaster itself, responses, and recovery efforts.

Discourse communities and operations of discourses in post-disaster settings

In the context of disasters, Holm (2012) proposes using the term disaster discourse, signifying “the ensemble of cultural forms – cognitive schemata, scientific concepts, narrative plots, metaphorical images, rhetorical questions, and other devices” (p. 52) that influence the way we perceive and frame disasters. He is particularly interested in the disaster discourse that determines how disaster vulnerability and resilience are socially constructed. This understanding of disasters was put forth by Rousseau (Pantti, Wahl-Jorgensen, & Cottle, 2012), who was one of the first to propose to interpret disasters through the lens of human agency and cultural meaning or social construction.

Using both inductive and deductive analyses, we began conceptualizing the process of discourse operations in disaster settings. Depicted in Figure 1.1, this process as we see it captures the dynamic, iterative, and recursive process of discourse operations – production, distribution, consumption, and institutionalization – in the post-disaster recovery context. In line with critical and social constructionist theories, it depicts multiple communities of discourse production with inherently diverse understandings of disaster and post-disaster recovery that compete for dominance and influence (see Appendix). They are separate, but not exclusive, entities as they function to inform, refer to, and fit with each other as they disseminate knowledge to construct and constitute disaster and recovery processes. As these diverse communities of discourse reflect...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Figures and tables
• Abbreviations
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction
• 1 Discursive (re)production of disaster and recovery
• 2 Haiti, history, and the social reproduction of vulnerability
• 3 Political-economic (re)production of disaster and recovery: disaster industrial complex
• 4 Non-profiteering: innovation, technology, and the problem of participation
• 5 Chaos and order: securitization, cleansing, and displacement
• 6 Environmental justice and extractivist disaster recovery: locating sustainability
• 7 Silences, solidarity, and resistance: psychosocial recovery, spirituality, and mutual aid
• 8 Dismantling the disaster industrial complex: praxis for a people’s recovery
• Appendix: Guiding philosophical assumptions, interpretive frameworks, and methods
• Index