Week 6 Assignment

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Apr 3, 2024

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Week 6 Assignment Therien 1 Week 6 Assignment Marissa Therien American Military University EDMG502 12/17/2023

Week 6 Assignment Therien 2 Introduction For this composition, the book "What is a Disaster? New Answers to Old Questions" by Perry & Quarantelli will be reviewed as the primary resource, an addition to previously reviewed course material, this paper serves to delve further into content, especially part II. Initially published in 2005, the material offers varying perspectives from authors and editors on disaster topics and adjacent topics, such as how disasters have changed over time and the media's influence on a catastrophe. This review will also be sourced from contributors from the document, such as Buckle, Boin, Stallings, and other contributors, in highlighted segments through the first part of the referenced material. Disaster and Collective Stress The chapter begins with Barton reflecting on the 1960s and how the disasters then were focused on the cold war. Barton additionally mentions that at the time of his reflection in 1961, sociology was not considered a recognized science, but its peers of anthropology and psychology were recognized sciences by the National Academy of Sciences and National Research Council. Barton recounts that during the 1960s, “ disaster research consisted of a few dozen field studies of natural and accidental disasters, along with some studies of wartime bombing including the great fire raids on Hamburg, Dresden and Tokyo and the final paroxysms of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The studies were mostly observational or based on informant stories, accompanied by such aggregate statistics on damage and loss as were available; a handful had quantitative sample survey data on behavior of individuals and organizations ” ( Perry, R. W., & Quarantelli, E. L. (Eds.). (2005), pg, 126). Bartons review of additional literature from the period of the 1960s only observe details on disasters such as tornados, explosions, floods or hurricanes that only include a few varying communities. Through Barton’s writing, the audience is reminded

Week 6 Assignment Therien 3 that during this time period of the 1960s, domestic disasters, natural or manmade such as tornados, hurricanes or explosions took a backseat to the threat of a nuclear war across the nation. Essentially, the idea of disasters and preparation from disaster shifted from local community level to national scale as the threat of nuclear war loomed. Because of the nuclear threat that impacted the disaster mindset, Barton “was forced to come up with a much broader concept than the usual one of disaster, to avoid the folly of extrapolating from how communities and nations dealt with localized stresses to the problems of the nationwide impact of nuclear war, and thus encouraging the idea that nuclear war was a workable national strategy. My overall concept was “collective stress” (Barton 1963, 1969).” ( Perry, R. W., & Quarantelli, E. L. (Eds.). (2005) pg 126). To expand on his theory of collective stress, Barton and colleagues set off for Greece and investigated an area that had previously suffered from a wildfire disaster. Reinforcing Barton’s original beliefs in his collective stress theory, the study from Greece “ suggests that victims of the wildfires in Greece did not appreciate important social values which bring a society together, they have a low trust in institutions, and they have a weak social cohesion which perhaps pre-existed the disaster; just the disaster has made all of them worse.” (Barton, A. H., 1969). Barton’s collective stress theory can be applied to modern disasters such as the terrorist attacks on 9/11 in which large numbers of the population were unable to live under normal conditions for the duration of the event and the weeks and months following. The collective stress from this terrorist attack affected a large mass population for months following the event, and still affects modern society as it is remembered annually during the same time of the year. Broken down by sudden, gradual and chronic stress levels, Barton ultimately defines the relationship between disaster and stress relevant to the type of stress the disaster creates for the individual surviving or experiencing said disaster; “ Using the concept of “collective stress”

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Week 6 Assignment Therien 4 to examine a wide range of situations of large-scale deprivation varying on several dimensions, with “local physical disaster” as one subtype, raises important theoretical questions and points to a wide range of empirical cases from which to learn answers .” ( Perry, R. W., & Quarantelli, E. L. (Eds.). (2005) pg 151). Overall, disasters should be viewed as a social problem and how societies are left to deal with them, both on the community and induvial level. Crisis to Disaster Boin begins to examine how a disaster is defined and challenges the idea that the most popular term for disaster is often involved with natural disasters or war by way of both including devastation. “ The founders of the disaster field primarily, but not exclusively, concentrated on public responses to natural disasters, but they also had a keen eye for war preparation relevance .” ( Perry, R. W., & Quarantelli, E. L. (Eds.). (2005) pg 155). Boin is firm in that as disasters change, so should the definition of disaster – it must be adapted as the phenomenon of disaster changes. “A disaster, then, indicates that the normal functioning of a human system— typically a community or geographically connected set of communities—is severely disrupted. Disruption in itself is not a sufficient condition for disaster sociologists to speak of a disaster. ” ( Perry, R. W., & Quarantelli, E. L. (Eds.). (2005) pg 159) Through Boin’s contribution, it is noted that while disruption of the normal environment is included as part of a disaster, disruption itself is not the sole parameters for the definition of a disaster. Crisis and disaster are interchangeable to lay person, but academics who build on disaster theory understand that disaster and crisis are terms relative to each other but not interchangeable. “ With a slight conceptual jog of the imagination, we can relate both concepts: a disaster, then, is viewed as a crisis with a devastating ending (Boin, 2005). Not every crisis turns into a disaster: In 1962, the Cuban Missile Crisis brought the world on the brink of nuclear war, but the American and Soviet

Week 6 Assignment Therien 5 leaders were able to stave off disaster. Every disaster does fit the crisis definition (e.g., the multiple crises caused by Hurricane Katrina in the late summer of 2005 )” (Boin, A, 2007). Boin believes that the crisis to disaster terminology can only be as useful as updated and changing accounts of crisis and disaster are defined. Mandated Definitions, Local Knowledge, and Complexity Buckle examines the idea of the definition of perceptions of disaster that are often similar but not compatible with each other, and acknowledges that overall, there is trouble finding a consensus on what exactly a disaster is and how to define it. “ Whether we need a precisely agreed perspective or a commonly accepted definition is open to debate. Of course, it is useful when talking about an event, process or phenomena to have a common and shared understanding, but the level of precision we can achieve may be limited especially when dealing with complex social phenomena such as disasters. ” ( Perry, R. W., & Quarantelli, E. L. (Eds.). (2005) pg 173). A mild call out to Barton’s collective stress theory, Buckle notes that having a common name and parameters with a shared understanding for terminology of disaster would be beneficial when dealing with the social aspects of disaster. Interestingly enough, while linking common terms and shared understanding to social benefits in a disaster, Buckle goes on to note that when defining a disaster multiple interchangeable terms are used and understood, displaying that certain key elements are the same for a disaster or crisis and often the point is understood despite the terminology. Buckle challenges traditional lists of elements of disaster that are unable to deal with the totality and complexity of disaster. Disaster, Crisis, Collective Stress and Mass Deprivation

Week 6 Assignment Therien 6 Acting essentially as an academic respondent, Stallings main portion of his contribution to the literature reviews the work of the four previous contributors and the similarities and differences in each. The authors contributing the four chapters to this section provide two different answers to this question. One answer is practical: A definition of disaster triggers the provision of special goods and services. The chapter by Buckle (“Disaster: Mandated Definitions, Local Knowledge and Complexity”) deals with practical definitions in the context of public policymaking and disaster management. The other answer to the question is analytical: A definition of disaster is important in conducting research. Such a definition affects all aspects of the research process from the selection of cases for study, to what data are to be collected, to what to make of the findings. The chapters by Barton (“Disaster and Collective Stress”), Boin (“From Crisis to Disaster: Towards an Integrative Perspective”), and Smith (“In the Eyes of the Beholder? Making Sense of the System(s) of Disaster(s)” are concerned with analytical definitions of disaster. Each type of definition, practical and analytical, requires the resolution of interesting issues and the answering of important questions.” ( Perry, R. W., & Quarantelli, E. L. (Eds.). (2005) pg 238). When reviewing Buckle’s work, Stallings notes that Buckle believes both analysists and practitioners on the side of disaster should consider disaster as a subtype and integrate laypeople. Moving on to Barton’s work, Stallings credits Barton for his work on updating his original framework for The US National Academy of Sciences as well as his publish book on similar topics and goes on to praise Barton for the idea that disaster is only perceived in a social system when expected conditions of life are disrupted. Through reviewing Boin’s chapter, Stallings sees similarities between his and the work of Boin but notes that it seems as though Boin struggles with the ability to differentiate between objective and subjective.

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Week 6 Assignment Therien 7 Stallings’ Thesis Overall, when looking at Stallings’ observations, many are very similar to the aforementioned authors in the assigned literature. However, it can be said that the theme of Stallings overall thesis work is more themed toward policy and legality as opposed to terminology and sociology we see with other authors. Stallings also seemingly takes issue with policymakers not using expanded research for furthering critical analysis and pointing out conflicting policies.

Week 6 Assignment Therien 8 Citations Barton, A. H. (1969). Communities in disaster; A sociological analysis of collective stress situations (1st ed.). Garden City, NY: Doubleday. Boin, A., ‘T Hart, P. (2007). The Crisis Approach. In: Handbook of Disaster Research. Handbooks of Sociology and Social Research. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-32353-4_3 Buckle, P. (2003). Some Contemporary Issues in Disaster Management. International Journal of Mass Emergencies & Disasters, 21(1), 109-122. https://doi.org/10.1177/028072700302100105 Buckle, P. (n.d.). Disaster Management, Community Capability, Resilience and Vulnerability. https://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/document? repid=rep1&type=pdf&doi=f7e75d0f783dc0fb6f0d211d6e51ff4be5f2ca2e Perry, R. W., & Quarantelli, E. L. (Eds.). (2005). What is a disaster? New Answers to Old Questions. United States of America: International Research Committee on Disasters. Drabek, T. E. (2007). Social problems perspectives, disaster research and emergency management: Intellectual contexts, theoretical extensions, and policy implications. NY: International Research Committee on Disasters.

Week 6 Assignment

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