1st Edition

Community Disaster Recovery and Resiliency Exploring Global Opportunities and Challenges

Edited By DeMond Shondell Miller, Jason David Rivera Copyright 2011
    634 Pages 28 B/W Illustrations
    by CRC Press

    Once again nature’s fury has taken a toll in pain, suffering, and lives lost. In recognition of the need for a rapid and appropriate response, CRC Press will donate $5 to the American Red Cross for every copy of Community Disaster Recovery and Resiliency: Exploring Global Opportunities and Challenges sold.

    In the past, societies would learn from disasters and move the location of their urban development to safer areas, allowing naturally occurring ecosystems to maintain themselves and for societies to exist symbiotically with the environment. These days, however, it seems that society no longer takes cues from the environment but rather relies on technical advancement to attempt to control and overcome the environment, sometimes with wholly unsuccessful and even catastrophic results.

    Emphasizing non-traditional approaches to disaster recovery and rebuilding communities, Community Disaster Recovery and Resiliency: Exploring Global Opportunities and Challenges brings together leading research from top academics and scholars on the different ways various societies have experienced disasters, learned from them, and revised their thinking about building community preparedness and resiliency pre- and post-disaster.

    • Provides a clear, concise, and up-to-date understanding of best practices for rebuilding community institutions and community development after a disaster
    • Focuses on integrated solutions for ecological restoration and community development in disaster recovery planning and implementation
    • Compares and contrasts community rebuilding between different nations at different stages of development, economic power, and stability
    • Includes case studies that illustrate best practices, integrating the concept of community and community rebuilding for local, national, and international stakeholders

    All chapters offer diverse community examples that form a framework for comparing best practices. They focus on integrated solutions for ecological restoration and community development and explain how communities can reduce their vulnerability to disasters and reduce recovery time following a disaster. The book indentifies the opportunities and challenges communities are most likely to face on the road to recovery and supplies the interdisciplinary, social scientific understanding required to effectively address those challenges.

    The Unique Opportunities and Challenges from a Social Scientific Perspective

    OPPORTUNITIES AND CHALLENGES FOR BUILDING A COMMUNITY-BASED INSTITUTIONAL INFRASTRUCTURE; DeMond S. Miller & Jason D. Rivera

    Disaster Preparedness among Community-Based Organizations in the City and County of San Francisco: Serving the Most Vulnerable; Liesel Ritchie, Kathleen Tierney, & Brandi Gilbert
    Safe Schools for the Community: A Case and Tool for Disaster-Proof Schools; Sanjaya Bhatia
    Opportunities and Challenges of Battered Women’s Shelters in the Aftermath of a Disaster; Bethany L. Brown

    OPPORTUNITIES AND CHALLENGES FOR SOCIAL AND CULTURAL REVITALIZATION; DeMond S. Miller
    Disaster Resilience: Exploring All Hazards and Cross‑Cultural Perspectives; Douglas Paton & Li-ju Jang
    Community Resilience in New Orleans East: Deploying the Cultural Toolkit within a Vietnamese-American Community; Emily Chamlee-Wright & Virgil Henry Storr
    Social Capital after a Disaster: A Case Study of the 2008 Flood in Cedar Rapids, Iowa; Kevin F. Adler

    OPPORTUNITIES AND CHALLENGES FOR ECONOMIC RECOVERY; Jason D. Rivera
    Natural Disasters, Climate Change, and Recovery: The Sustainability Question in Post-Ivan Grenada; Jonathan Rosenberg
    Information Commodification and Social Capital in Local Street Markets; Michèle Companion
    Role of Information and Communication Technologies in Disaster Rehabilitation in Agriculture and Ecotourism: Bukit Lawang, Indonesia; Arul Chib, Anisha Baghudana, & Shilvia Kasdani

    OPPORTUNITIES AND CHALLENGES FOR PUBLIC HEALTH AND SAFETY; Jason D. Rivera
    The Irrawaddy Crisis: Myanmar and Cyclone Nargis—Challenges and Opportunities for Change; Joel C. Yelin, DeMond S. Miller
    Challenge of the Worried Well in the Event of a Pandemic or Terrorist Attack; Thom Curtis
    Aborigines’ and Migrant Settlers’ Crisis and Reconstruction Efforts in Two Yoruba Communities in Southwestern Nigeria; Adisa Ademola & Agunbiade Ojo Melvin
    An Assault on the Community’s Fabric: Tragedy, Challenges, and Opportunities of Social Shootings; Anita Bledsoe–Gardner

    OPPORTUNITIES AND CHALLENGES FOR HOUSING AND HOUSING POLICY; Christopher Gonzalez
    Housing Reconstruction in Post-Mitch Nicaragua: Two Case Studies from the Communities of San Dionisio and Ocotal; Esther Leemann
    Housing Reconstruction in Tamil Nadu: The Disaster after the Tsunami in India; Jennifer Duyne Barenstein
    Building Earthquake-Resilient Communities; Alka Dhameja

    OPPORTUNITIES AND CHALLENGES FOR PRIVATE–PUBLIC PARTNERSHIPS; DeMond S. Miller
    Bridging the Public–Private Partnership in Disaster Management in Bangladesh; Md. Mahfuzar Rahman Chowdhury
    Building Disaster-Resilient Communities: The Public–Private Partnership Approach; Uma Medury
    Patterns of Public–Private Partnership in Community Reconstruction: The Case of Taiwan after the Chi-Chi Earthquake; Jou-juo Chu

    OPPORTUNITIES AND CHALLENGES FOR DISASTER MITIGATION; Jason D. Rivera
    How Nations Should Develop Disaster Plans for Mitigation, Preparedness, Response, and Recovery: Lessons Learned from Major International Disasters; Glenn L. Starks
    Private Resilience Responses against Collective Recovery Interests: The Case of the Mega-Fires of Ilia, Greece, in August 2007; Kalliopi Sapountzaki & Anna Papachatzi
    Preplanning for Recovery; Julia Becker, Wendy Saunders, Lesley Hopkins, Kim Wright, & David Johnston
    Preparedness for Emergency: Learning from War-Caused Disaster in Israel; Alex Altshuler, Faisal Azaiza, & Yael Yishai
    Conclusion: From Recovery to Resilience: Long-Lasting Social Change and Disaster Mitigation; Jason D. Rivera & DeMond S. Miller

    Biography

    DeMond Shondell Miller is a Professor of Sociology and Director of the Liberal Arts and Sciences Institute for Research and Community Service at Rowan University (Glassboro, New Jersey). He has worked as principal investigator to facilitate research projects involving natural and human-induced ecological disasters, environmental issues, and community satisfaction. His primary area of specialization is environmental sociology (disaster studies and the study of the social construction of place), community development and community organizing, and social impact assessment. Dr. Miller has presented and published several professional papers; recent examples of such work can be found in Space and Culture: An International Journal of Social Spaces, International Journal of the Humanities, Journal of Black Studies, The Journal of Public Management and Social Policy, Sociological Spectrum, and The International Journal of Culture, Tourism and Hospitality Research. Recently, he has contributed to several edited volumes including Through the Eye of Katrina: Social Justice in the United States and The Sociology of Katrina: Perspectives on a Modern Catastrophe; he is the co-author of Hurricane Katrina and the Redefinition of Landscape with Jason D. Rivera (Lexington Press) and coeditor of African American and Community Engagement in Higher Education: Community Service, Service Learning and Community-Based Research with S. Evans, C. Taylor, and M. Dunlap (State University of New York Press).

    Jason David Rivera is a Research Associate in the William J. Hughes Center for Public Policy at The Richard Stockton College of New Jersey. His research focuses on social vulnerability to natural and manmade disasters with an emphasis on minority experiences. Additionally, his research highlights institutional structures that have historically perpetuated social vulnerability within minority and low-income communities. These research findings have been incorporated into policy recommendations that make mitigation, response, and recovery more efficient. Examples of his work can be found in the Journal of Black Studies, Journal of Applied Security Research: Prevention and Response in Asset Protection, Terrorism and Violence, the Journal of Public Management and Social Policy, Sociological Spectrum, The Journal for the Study of Radicalism, Space and Culture, The Sociology of Katrina: Perspectives on a Modern Catastrophe, Through the Eye of the Storm: Social Justice in the United States, and Dangers in the Incommensurability of Globalization: Socio-Political Volatilities. He is coauthor of Hurricane Katrina and the Redefinition of Landscape, with DeMond S. Miller (Lexington Press).

    … brings together leading research from top academics and scholars on the different ways various societies have experienced disasters, learned from them, and revised their thinking about building community preparedness and resiliency pre- and post-disaster. It provides a concise understanding of best practices for rebuilding community institutions and community development after a disaster; focuses on integrated solutions for ecological restoration and community development in disaster recovery planning and implementation ... compares and contrasts community rebuilding between different nations at different stages of development, economic power, and stability. … includes case studies that illustrate best practices, integrating the concept of community and community rebuilding for local, national, and international stakeholders.
    MCEER, May 2011

    In addition to describing recent disaster recovery projects, this volume encourages national leaders to stimulate social change that makes communities more disaster resistant and develop public policy that enables a culture of resilience. The 24 chapters identify opportunities for building a community-based infrastructure, revitalizing social and economic systems, and promoting public health and safety. The contributors also recommend best practices for housing reconstruction, public-private partnerships, and disaster planning. The case studies are drawn from San Francisco, New Orleans, Iowa, Grenada, Indonesia, Myanmar, Nigeria, Nicaragua, Bangladesh, Greece, and Israel. Miller is a professor of sociology at Rowan University, and Rivera is a research associate in public policy at the Richard Stockton College of New Jersey.
    —In Research Book News, booknews.com, February 2011