Module 5: Disaster Response and Post Disaster Recovery
4 Credits

Rationale

Disaster response and post disaster recovery are among the two most important aspects of disaster management and in recent years have emerged as specialized fields of study. With the increasing incidence and intensity of disaster events there is a constant demand from the field for professionals trained in the basics of disaster response and related management practices. However, critical gaps in training are observed in disaster planning, contingency planning, and vulnerability assessment. In addition, skills and abilities to work with multidisciplinary teams in disaster response situations are also required. This highlights the need for having a broad understanding of the multiple stakeholders involved in disaster response and the standards to be upheld in humanitarian aid, relief and rehabilitation and development. This module addresses these concerns.

The post disaster recovery on the other hand focuses on issues ranging from disaster's impact on people, their life and livelihoods and the process of recovery. Often such recovery process is not inclusive and can create new vulnerabilities and fresh disaster risk. The module engages with various broader models of recovery and the role of different stakeholders in this process.

• To analyze responses of communities, government and other organizations
• To identify and understand various response functions
• To develop capacity to estimate relief needs during a disaster situation, especially rapid needs assessment and plan for its delivery
• To analyze integrated response management models and identify their strengths and weaknesses
• To understand long term impact of disaster on people's life and society
• To identify various phases of post disaster recovery process and its key challenges
• To develop recovery plan

UNIT 1 Introduction to Disaster Response

• Nature and type of immediate response. Factors shaping public responses cultural contexts, past experiences, expectation from government, community behavior, difference in response to natural and technological disaster.
• Organized response- Government, Non Government and Community based Organization response. Business organization's response to disaster. Policies, Organizational culture and crisis management; Legal Framework.

UNIT 2 Key Disaster Response functions

• Post Disaster Need Assessment, Estimation of basic needs-Food, Water, Health, Shelter etc. Concept of Relief- policy, relief delivery and management. Standards and Best Practices in Relief operations-SPHERE standards. Techniques of rapid needs assessment. Needs as the key factor in determining response.
• Warning and public evacuation, Search and rescue, Sanitation, Dead body disposal, Debris Management, Restoration of key infrastructure.

UNIT 3 Public health care management

• Introduction to public health (including Public Mental Health) in disasters- Public health (including mental health) impact of disasters.
• Overview of public health response – Health System and Health Services Response. Health System Response - Hospital and emergency services preparedness and response. Health Services response – Epidemiology, Communicable Disease Control, Environmental Health, Nutrition and Food Security, Disability and Psychosocial Health, Sexual and Reproductive Health.
• Public health impact and needs assessment in disasters.

UNIT 4 Logistics

• Introduction to Logistics and Supply Chain; Humanitarian Space and Principles; Challenges and Scope of Humanitarian Logistics; Building blocks of preparedness; Information and knowledge management in Humanitarian Logistics;
• Cross learning (Governments- Commercial Sector- Armed forces- National and international agencies in humanitarian Logistics); Humanitarian logistics professionalism; Cultural perspectives on Humanitarian Logistics; Supply network – an enabler for development

UNIT 5 Response Management

• Emergency Planning - Information management, Resource management, Contingency planning, Business Continuity Plans, Safety of response personnel
• Organizational structure- Coordination among various agencies, Communication, Team Management, Leadership in Emergencies.
• Approaches to integrated response management-Incident Command System (ICS) and Incident Response System (IRS), Community based Response management

UNIT 6 Introduction to Post Disaster Recovery

• Concept of Recovery, Rehabilitation and Reconstruction. Impact of Disaster- Societal changes; displacement; impact on livelihood; infrastructural changes; impact on public health; environmental changes; political and organizational changes; psychological impact; changes in business environment. Implication of Damage and Loss Assessment methods for post disaster recovery.

UNIT 7 Developing Recovery plan

• Phases of Recovery. Laws and Policies. Elements of recovery plan. Recovery context; Competing values in models of recovery-restore existing or reimagined community.
• Community participation in planning process. Role of planning experts, community leaders and other interest groups. Role of NGO, CBO and FBO in recovery process, Role of Media.

UNIT 8 Disaster Risk Reduction during Recovery

• Mitigating disaster risk during recovery- land use, diversification of livelihood, disaster risk assessment methodologies and making choice under uncertainty. Recovery management approaches- centralized versus decentralized, community as participants.

• Drabek, T. E. 1986. Human System Responses to Disaster: an inventory of sociological findings, Springer-Verlag.
• Kapuchu, N., Arslan, T. and Collins, M.T. 2010. “Examining Intergovernmental and Inter organizational Response to Catastrophic Disasters: Towards a Network Centered Approach”, Administration and Society, Vol. 42(2): 222-247.
• Funabashi, Y. And Kitazawa, K. 2012. “Fukushima in review: A Complex disaster, a disastrous response”, Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, Vol. 68 (2): 9-21.
• Paul, B.K. 2006. “Disaster Relief Efforts: an update”, Progress in Development Studies, Vol. 6 (3): 211-223.
• Sphere. 2011. “Humanitarian Charter and Minimum Standards in Humanitarian Response”, Handbook by The Sphere Project, available at http://www.sphereproject.org
• Bollin, C. and Khanna, S. 2007. “Review of Post Disaster Recovery Need Assessment Methodologies”, Report commissioned by UNDP.
• Lalonde, C. 2011. “Managing Crises through Organizational development: a conceptual framework”, Disasters, Vol. 35(2):443-464.
• Kruke, B.I. And Olsen, O.E. 2012. “Knowledge creation and reliable decision making in complex emergencies”, Vol. 36(2): 212-232.
• Gabriel, P. 2002. “The Development of Municipal Emergency Management Planning in Victoria, Australia”, International Journal of Mass Emergency and Management, Vol. 20(3):293-307.
• Harvey, P.A. and Reed, R.A. 2005. “Planning environmental sanitation programmes in emergencies”, Disasters, Vol. 29(2): 129-151
• Chang, Y., Wilkinson, S., Brunsdon, D., Seville, E. And Potangaroa, R. 2011. “An integrated approach: managing resources for post disaster reconstruction”, Disasters, Vol. 35(4): 739-765.
• Regnier, P., Neri, B., Scuteri, S. and Miniati, S. 2008. “From emergency relief to livelihood recovery Lessons learned from post tsunami experiences in Indonesia and India”, Disaster Prevention and Management, Vol. 17(3): 410-429
• Powell, P.J. 2011. “Post disaster reconstruction: A current analysis of Gujarat's response after the 2001 earthquake”, Environmental Hazards, Vol. 10(3-4): 279-292.
• Das, K. 2002. “Social Mobilization for Rehabilitation”, Economic and Political Weekly, Vol. 37(48): 4784-4788.
• Amaratunga, D. and Haigh, R. 2011. (eds) Post Disaster Reconstruction of the Built Environment, Wiley-Blackwell.
• Clarke, M., Fanany, I. and Kenny, S. 2010. (eds) Post Disaster Reconstruction: Lessons from Aceh, Earthscan
• Berke, P. R. and Campanella, T.J. 2006. “Planning for Post Disaster Resiliency”, The ANNALS of American Academy of Political and Social Science, Vol. 604:192
• Pelling, M. And Dill, K. 2010. “Disaster politics: tipping points for change in the adaptation of sociopolitical regimes”, Progress in Human Geography, Vol. 34(1): 21-37.
• Jong, Joop De. (2002). Trauma, War, and Violence Public Mental Health in Socio-Cultural Context (pp. 1-454). New York: Kluwer Academic Publishers Miller, Kenneth E, & Rasco, Lisa M. (2004).
• The Mental Health of Refugees: Ecological Approaches to Healing and Adaptation (pp. 1-429). New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc.

Additional Reading

• Scanlon, Joseph. 1994. “The Role of EOCs in Emergency Management: A Comparison of American and Canadian Experience.” International Journal of Mass Emergencies and Disasters Vol. 12 (1): 51-75.
• Sylves, R.T. 1991. “Adopting Integrated Emergency Management in the United States: Political and Organizational Challenges”, International Journal of Mass Emergency and Management, Vol. 9(3): 413-424.
• Dombrowsky, W.F. And Schorr, J.K. 1986. “Angst and the Masses: Collective Behavior Research in Germany”, International Journal of Mass Emergency and Management, Vol. 4(2): 61-89.
• Allen, B. L. 2007. “Environmental Justice and Expert Knowledge in the wake of a Disaster”, Social Studies of Science, Vol. 37(1): 103-110
• Aeberhard, P. 2008. “Expectations are changing for Disaster relief”, Non Profit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly, Supplement to Vol. 37 (1): 17-24S.
• Schultz, J. And Soreide, T. 2008. “Corruption in emergency procurement”, Disasters, Vol. 32(4): 516-536.
• Edgington, D.W. 2010. Reconstructing Kobe, UBC Press.
 
NOTE: The details of these course modules are subject to some modification. The TISS and IFRC teams are still working on the finalisation of the details of these course modules. However the list of course modules, including their names and the broad areas that they will cover are final.