Mapping Vulnerability

Disasters, Development and People

Greg Bankoff, Dorothea Hilhorst, George Frerks, Greg Bankoff, Georg Frerks, Dorothea Hilhorst, Greg Bankoff, Georg Frerks, Dorothea Hilhorst

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• eBook ISBN: 9781136561610
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Economics
• Subtopic: Development Economics
• Index: Economics

Raging floods, massive storms and cataclysmic earthquakes: every year up to 340 million people are affected by these and other disasters, which cause loss of life and damage to personal property, agriculture, and infrastructure. So what can be done? The key to understanding the causes of disasters and mitigating their impacts is the concept of 'vulnerability'.

Mapping Vulnerability analyses 'vulnerability' as a concept central to the way we understand disasters and their magnitude and impact. Written and edited by a distinguished group of disaster scholars and practitioners, this book is a counterbalance to those technocratic approaches that limit themselves to simply looking at disasters as natural phenomena. Through the notion of vulnerability, the authors stress the importance of social processes and human-environmental interactions as causal agents in the making of disasters. They critically examine what renders communities unsafe - a condition, they argue, that depends primarily on the relative position of advantage or disadvantage that a particular group occupies within a society's social order. The book also looks at vulnerability in terms of its relationship to development and its impact on policy and people's lives, through consideration of selected case studies drawn from Africa, Asia and Latin America. Mapping Vulnerability is essential reading for academics, students, policymakers and practitioners in disaster studies, geography, development studies, economics, environmental studies and sociology.

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Half Title page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• List of Figures, Tables and Boxes
• List of Contributors
• Acknowledgements
• List of Acronyms and Abbreviations
• Introduction: Mapping Vulnerability
• 1 Theorizing Vulnerability in a Globalized World: A Political Ecological Perspective1
• 2 The Historical Geography of Disaster: ‘Vulnerability' and ‘Local Knowledge' in Western Discourse1
• 3 The Need for Rethinking the Concepts of Vulnerability and Risk from a Holistic Perspective: A Necessary Review and Criticism for Effective Risk Management
• 4 Complexity and Diversity: Unlocking Social Domains of Disaster Response
• 5 The Lower Lempa River Valley, El Salvador: Risk Reduction and Development Project
• 6 El Niño Events, Forecasts and Decision-making
• 7 Vulnerable Regions versus Vulnerable People: An Ethiopian Case Study
• 8 From Vulnerability to Empowerment
• 9 Progress in Analysis of Social Vulnerability and Capacity
• 10 Vulnerability Reduction: A Task for the Vulnerable People Themselves
• 11 Macro-economic Concepts of Vulnerability: Dynamics, Complexity and Public Policy
• 12 Gendering Vulnerability Analysis: Towards a More Nuanced Approach
• 13 Assessment of Capability and Vulnerability
• Conclusion: Vulnerability Analysis as a Means of Strengthening Policy Formulation and Policy Practice
• Notes
• References
• Index