Most often, the term ‘community’ in many areas of policy is taken to mean a place- based subset of the population – a locality, neighbourhood or region. In emergencies and disasters, it is most often those in a specific locale or region at risk from some hazard, or else used as a general descriptor capturing the general public. This is an insufficient definition. The thing that defines a ‘community’ is a commonality of interest, which holds together, at least at particular times, a group of people and provides the impetus for shared attitudes or actions. In his classic work Landscapes
of Fear, surely relevant to disasters, Yi-Fu Tuan (1979) explored shared threat as the basis of community. Certainly, protection against natural or human dangers was one reason for people gathering together in and creating villages and towns, but not the only reason (Boyden, 1987). Positively, a community may be based as much on shared opportunity as shared threat.
However we define community, the term conveys multiple meanings, and iden- tification of this should inform how we think about community engagement in understanding and responding to emergencies and disasters. Table 4.1 identifies major types of common interest and the definable community attached to those in order to provide a framework for identifying different communities. Only the first is defined clearly by place, and the rest may at times have a place focus, but often do not. Table 4.1 shows the diversity of what ‘community’ or ‘the public’ comprises.
This is a simple typology, and while more detail could be developed, it suffices for the purpose of clarifying important points. First, there are clearly many ‘commu- nities’ even in one small place, and these differ greatly in what they are interested in, the strength and nature of their ties to each other, the information that they may be open to, and so on. Second, individuals belong to more than one commu- nity – and generally several – which will, in multiple ways, be relevant to policy as a citizen, consumer, competitor and community member. Sensitivity to such multiple perspectives and allegiances complicate the design and implementation of participatory strategies; yet, recognition and their accommodation are imperative.
Third, commonality of interest does not imply a constant degree of agreement and collaboration – within a particular community, there may be both cooperative and competitive behaviour. For example, while the members of a real estate associa- tion may work together in the interest of the industry as a whole, individuals may be in fierce competition in the marketplace. Similarly, while the members of a local community may cooperate closely to ensure safety in the face of fire or flood threat, they may compete or even fight over other issues, or simply ignore each other.
The different communities sketched in Table 4.1 will have varying require- ments and degrees of engagement with policy and management in emergencies and disasters. These will be explored further in the next section. In terms of the focus of this book – policy and institutions – they will also have very different interests in, access to and influence over the political processes that define policy directions and agendas of institutional change. Recalling terminology from Chapter 2, some may be members of the policy community, engaged in policy debates; others may be active in policy networks, exerting more influence.
This issue of influence on higher-level policy and institutional design is espe- cially relevant in the disasters field, where it is typically the least powerful – those lacking in power, resources, political voice and influence – and who are the most severely affected. Can poor illiterate village fishermen, at risk of storm surge in cyclone seasons, be involved in high-level policy discussions, or can their knowl- edge and interests be fairly represented in such discussions? Conversely, should senior officials presume to understand and represent potentially affected communi- ties? These are simplified choices, but beg the question of matching the who, why and what of community engagement and public participation in terms of selecting participatory strategies (what) that fit the community in question (who) and the purpose of participation (why).
Table 4.1 Defining community Type of
‘community’ Commonality of
interest Relevance to interests in disasters and emergencies (examples)
1 Place-based (spatial)
Determined by affinity with or stake in the condition of a place (neighbourhood, town or region)
Concern over the protection of local lives, livelihoods and assets at risk from natural hazards
2 Familial, kinship
Members of a located or extended family or kin network
May be local to global in extent
Impacts of hazards on relatives, whether nearby or in distant locations
May lobby for assistance from distant places; assistance provided to victims 3 Cultural,
social, political Communities linked by culture, ethnicity, religious belief, ideology, recreational activities, political beliefs, etc.
Risks to others in relevant community recovery
programmes run through faith- based agencies, political lobbying, heritage protection groups and post-disaster activities
4 Employment,
profession Organized groups of people, often spatially dispersed, linked by profession or employment within a particular career type
Risk managers, fire-fighting professionals, floodplain
managers, paramedics; individually influential at times, and as a group may advocate policy and management strategies 5 Economic,
sectoral
Linked by economic interests, across or within firms and locations (e.g. car parts manufacturing, tourism industry, fishing or forestry industries)
Farmers lobby staff working on post-cyclone farm compensation, petro-chemical industry safety programmes and foresters post- fire recovery
6 Knowledge based (epistemic communities)
Communities defined by a knowledge system (e.g.
an academic discipline or professional skill, such as typified by statisticians or communication managers)
Emergency management trainers, researchers, fire ecologists, floodplain hydrologists,
seismologists and epidemiologists
Three examples illustrate some of the main issues:
1 Risk awareness and sharing for wildfire community safety – community as local- ity. Australian wildfire agencies are redefining their role from fire-fighting to
‘community safety’. ‘Community’ in this context is primarily place based, but also refers to other communities (e.g. tourists) since anyone could potentially be caught in a wildfire. Community safety is seen as an explicit partnership with people at risk to jointly manage safety and property protection.
Participation varies from public information programmes aimed at the ‘general public’ to approaches to mobilize specific groups at risk through, for example, community fire guard, fire-wise approaches, community fire units (CFUs) and street corner meetings. These approaches are initiated and facilitated by the fire agencies, although in many cases communities will ask for support to establish a local group. One of the aims is to better prepare households and communities for wildfires, as well as to build capacity for staying and defending property during the passage of a fire. They vary in degree of participation from an interactive exchange of information to CFUs whose members are trained and equipped with basic fire-fighting gear so that they can actively protect property in their local area until fire agency crews arrive. Despite these efforts there are gaps in coverage and engagement, especially with more vulnerable groups, as well as questions of cost efficiency and resourcing.
2 Neighbourhood groups and NGOs negotiate solutions – cultural- and issue-based 7 Issue or topic
based Groups given identity and purpose by interest in or commitment to a substantive issue (e.g.
anti-pollution campaigners, advocates for disability services, consumer protection lobbies)
Toxic chemical action networks, lobbyists focusing on flood insurance, development aid activists, land interests pushing for relaxation of development rules and commercial groups using political pressure for adoption of their disaster- relevant products 8 Emergent May be a subset of type 7
above
People who previously had little interaction can become a tightly knit group as they experience and deal with a disaster (disaster can also exacerbate pre-existing divisions)
Post-impact, the ‘community’
works to restore itself and may take control of its recovery Groups demanding post-disaster compensation, support and institutional change
communities. The Indian Ocean tsunami of 26 December 2004 devastated many areas, including parts of southern Thailand. Recovery and the longer-term surviv- al and prosperity of affected areas depend on the vitality of the local economy.
This means that the flow of money into and within an area affected by disaster needs to reach all of those affected. The official recovery plan explicitly recognizes the importance of money flows over simply restoring buildings, but has ignored the micro-enterprises on which many people depend, as well as the very large informal economy. Instead, it supported the more obvious economic sector of small- and medium-sized enterprises. The interests of large-scale developers were also served through, in part, enhanced access to coastal land. Many of the area’s poorest people found that land they had occupied under traditional tenure was being taken from them for safety reasons to lower the exposure along the coast.
However, new hotels were being constructed in this zone. Many of the more marginalized communities worked with local and international NGOs and some politicians to negotiate solutions to the land issue. They also used their local and international personal networks and religious affiliations to attract support for rebuilding and re-establishing livelihoods.
3 Emergent community for recovery without government help. New Orleans post- Hurricane Katrina is hardly known for community participation and recovery;
but some local groups have organized themselves as ‘emergent communities’ (see Table 4.1). The Vietnamese population in the neighbourhood of East New Orle- ans was one of the poorest groups in one of the poorest cities in the US. They had limited interaction before Hurricane Katrina. After the disaster, however, local leaders emerged and the community organized to rebuild. It did so with very little help from government agencies; instead, it found itself in court opposing a contaminated waste site supported by state and local governments and located adjacent to the rebuilding community. A year after the disaster, this area has been largely rebuilt, and although one of the poorest neighbourhoods pre-Katrina appears to be thriving, restoration in most other devastated locations remains patchy and slow.