Measuring Vulnerability to Natural Hazards: Towards Disaster Resilient Societies
Contents: Foreword/Hans Van Ginkel. Preface/Salvano Briceno. Acknowledgements. Introduction/Janos J. Bogardi. I. Basic principles and theoretical basis: 1. Measuring vulnerability to promote disaster-resilient societies: conceptual frameworks and definitions/Jorn Birkmann. 2. Indicators and criteria for measuring vulnerability: theoretical bases and requirements/Jorn Birkmann. 3. Social levels and hazard (in)dependence in determining vulnerability/Stefan Schneiderbauer and Daniele Ehrlich. 4. User needs: why we need indicators/Angela Queste and Peter Lauwe. II. Vulnerability and environment: 5. Environmental components of vulnerability/Fabrice G. Renaud. 6. Human vulnerability to environmental change: an approach for UNEP\'s Global Environmental Outlook (GEO)/Marcel T.J. Kok, Vishal Narain, Steven Wonink and Jill Jager. III. Global, national and sub-national index approaches: 7. Review of global risk index projects: conclusions for subnational and local approaches/Mark Pelling. 8. The disaster risk index: overview of a quantitative approach/Pascal Peduzzi. 9. Disaster risk hotspots: a project summary/Maxx Dilley. 10. A system of indicators for disaster risk management in the Americas/Omar D. Cardona. 11. Multi-risk assessment of Europe\'s regions/Stefan Greiving. 12. Disaster vulnerability assessment: the Tanzania experience/Robert B. Kiunsi, Manoris V. Meshack et al. 13. A human security index/Erich J. Plate. IV. Local vulnerability assessment: 14. Community-based disaster risk index: Pilot implementation in Indonesia/Christina Bollin and Ria Hidajat. 15. Measuring vulnerability: the ADRC perspective for the theoretical basis and principles of indicator development/Masaru Arakida. 16. Vulnerability assessment: the Sectoral approach/Juan Carlos Villagran de Leon. 17. Self-assessment of coping capacity: participatory, proactive, and qualitative engagement of communities in their own risk management/Ben Wisner. 18. Measuring vulnerability in Sri Lanka at the local level/Jorn Birkmann, Nishara Fernando and Siri Hettige. V. Institutional vulnerability, coping and lessons learned: 19. Assessing institutionalised capacities and practices to reduce the risks of flood disaster/Louis Lebel, Elena Nikitina, Vladimir Kotov and Jesse Manuta. 20. Public sector financial vulnerability to disasters: the IIASA CATSIM model/Reinhard Mechler, Stefan Hochrainer, Joanne Linnerooth Bayer and Georg Pflug; Text box effective measurement of vulnerability is essential to help those most in harm\'s way/Simon Horner. 21. Overcoming the black hole: outline for a quantitative model to compare coping capacities across countries/Peter Billing, and Ulrike Madengruber. 22. A methodology for learning lessons: experiences at the European Level/Elisabeth Krausmann and Fesil Mushtaq. 23. Conclusion and recommendations/Jorn Birkmann. 24. Core terminology of disaster reduction: a comparative glossary/Katharina Thywissen. Index.
"A seemingly non-stop series of disasters has shown that societies worldwide seem unprepared for the threats posed by natural hazards: Hurricane Katrina, drought in Africa; flooding in China and Germany; earthquakes in Pakistan and India; a tsunami in South-East Asia; and forest fires in Portugal, Australia and North America.
The tragic impacts of these events drew short-term attention from policy makers, the media and the general public, but their response was too late to prevent serious harm. Societies need to measure their vulnerabilities in advance, and make adequate provisions. To do so, they have to understand the complex relationships between natural hazards and the related social, economic and environmental vulnerabilities. Recognizing and measuring vulnerabilities is the first and perhaps most important step towards disaster resilient societies.
Measuring Vulnerability to Natural Hazards presents a broad range of current approaches to measuring vulnerability. It provides a comprehensive overview of different concepts at the global, regional, national, and local levels and explores various schools of thought. More than 40 distinguished academics and practitioners analyse quantitative and qualitative approaches, and examine their strengths and limitations. This book contains concrete experiences and examples from Africa, Asia, the Americas and Europe to illustrate the theoretical analyses.
The authors provide answers to some of the key questions on how to measure vulnerability and they draw attention to issues with insufficient coverage, such as the environmental and institutional dimensions of vulnerability and methods to combine different methodologies.
This book is a unique compilation of state-of-the-art vulnerability assessment and is essential reading for academics, students, policy makers, practitioners, and anybody else interested in understanding the fundamentals of measuring vulnerability. It is a critical review that provides important conclusions which can serve as an orientation for future research towards more disaster resilient communities."
