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MIT 11 941 - Disaster Vulnerability and Resilience

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Lecture Notes: Disaster Vulnerability and Resilience Session 8 Lecturer: Thomas A. Birkland, University at Albany SUNY The Politics of Natural and Unnatural Hazards Introduction: Why study disasters from the perspective of political science? I. Theory of path dependency in public policy: once you start on a path, it is difficult to diverge from it. My thesis advisor focused on this area, and I followed his lead. II. I am from Alaska, and the Exxon Valdez oil spill had a profound impact on me. Despite its dependence on oil for economic development, even Alaska would prefer that oil not be spilled in Prince William Sound. Alaskans were annoyed. I originally wanted to write a paper about “internal colonialism.” Instead, I studied why big events or “focusing events” get people’s attention. a. Focusing events have agenda-setting effects. i. Studying them gives good insights into the way that policy works. ii. How do disasters influence policy or not in terms of mitigation? Some Basic Concepts III. Politics: a. Definition: the process by which a society decides who gets what, when they get it, why they get it. b. Some things are removed from the political and fall outside the range of things that society should decide. c. What is or is not political is a societal question. . IV. Public Policy: a. Definition: the outcome of a political process (what governments choose to do or not to do). b. For example, the United States government has chosen to not have a universal health care system V. The Policy Process (also known as the “Textbook” Process) a. Elements (set of steps developed during the 1970s): i. Problem definition: E.g. defining the problem of natural hazards as an “Act of God” vs. a problem with how structures are built to withstand the hazard. 1. The “Act of God” definition was the primary problem definition for natural hazards for many years (well into the twentieth century). a. Policy solution is the encouragement of prayer b. For many years, disaster relief was very ad hoc as a result.c. Such problem definition ignores the fact that hazards only become disasters when humans are negatively impacted by them. ii. Agenda setting: 1. Natural hazards get on the agenda because of the occurrence of a disaster (“focusing event”) that focuses attention on it. iii. Policy development 1. Once something is on the agenda, policy is crafted to address it. iv. Alternative selection v. Implementation vi. Evaluation vii. Feedback: 1. Process starts all over. b. Problems with the Stages Model: i. Steps don’t always happen ii. Order changes c. Revised View of the Policy Process i. Emphasis on agenda setting: 1. What is an agenda? 2. What are the levels of the agenda? a. The agenda universe: i. All of the ideas out there that could be translated into policy ii. Many ideas exist in the agenda universe that will never exist on any other agenda level. 1. Deconstruction of the constitution 2. Gay marriage? b. Systemic agenda: i. Issues that have begun circulating in political discourse. ii. Gay marriage, 20 years ago, was not something that could ever have been discussed within the U.S. political system, but today it appears in public discourse. iii. Things can move from the agenda universe into other levels of the agenda over time. c. Institutional agenda: i. A list of all items that any decision making body is dealing with at that time. d. Decision Agenda: i. Those items that are being addressed through actual policy measures. 1. I.e. If a bill is drafted and a decision must be made about whether or notto adopt a particular policy, that is on the decision agenda. 3. Each level of agenda gets smaller and smaller; in diagram form they would be a set of concentric circles. a. Society cannot deal with all ideas at any particular time. 4. The role of actors is to put things onto the agenda and to take things off the agenda a. Issue of political power arises: actors with more political power can suppress or promote items that serve their own interests. 5. Why is the Agenda important: a. Limited space i. Society has a limited amount of attention it can pay to agenda issues. b. More attention usually yields negative attention i. If you are a group that doesn’t want to do something about a problem, you want to keep the issue off the agenda. c. The act of getting an issue on the agenda can influence the choice of policies that are ultimately adopted: i. The process of putting something on the agenda is also a process of framing the issue in a particular way. 1. E.g. Columbine shooting: issue came down to either one of morals or of gun control. 2. Trend in school violence in 1999: it was declining. a. By framing the problem in the terms: “If it can happen here, it could happen anywhere,” the meaning translated that “if that could happen in a white upper middle class community it could happen anywhere,” and this affects policy measures. b. The recent Minnesota shooting is getting less attention. Why? i. It involved Native Americans? ii. It occurred in a rural area?iii. After 9/11 it seems like a relatively small event? iv. The Schiavo case and the Pope’s death have pushed it off the agenda? 6. How do issues reach the agenda? a. Changes in indicators of a problem i. Must evaluate whether it is a real problem or is it not a real problem. ii. Changes tend to grow slowly over time. iii. Some people (policy makers) can learn about the changes more quickly than others and mitigate both the effect of the problem and the public’s reactions. b. Focusing events: i. An event that is or is potentially harmful, affects a particular community of interest, and that is known by mass and elite actors almost simultaneously. 1. There is no particular information advantage for people in government, for example. ii. These events bring issues onto the agenda much faster than changes in indicators. ii. Improved Models of the Policy Process help us understand focusing events. 1. The “CNN Effect” a. Media coverage has increased its volume of coverage but not its information density. b. Media has a huge influence on disasters. i. Earthquake in Sumatra: Media over-emphasized “panic” despite the fact that social scientists have found that 2. Kingdon’s Streams Metaphor: a. A problem stream is where various problems persist. b. A policy stream is where problems are addressed in political


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