The devastating 7.8 earthquake that recently struck Nepal caused untold damage to buildings and has killed thousands of people, with many more missing. Following the devastation, the usual influx of aid began, as did finger pointing over who was to blame for the devastation. However, what this catastrophe has revealed most clearly is the disparate ways in which countries respond to disasters. Read on to learn about the response to the Nepalese earthquake, and the various global responses to disasters.

Responding to a Disaster

Emergency Management

Disasters, natural and man made, have been around since the beginning of time. However, the response to these disasters has not always been the same, and methods have varied as widely as the civilizations that have suffered them.

In the United States for example, we have FEMA (the Federal Emergency Management Agency). FEMA was founded in 1979 when five separate agencies that dealt with disasters consolidated into one. Although it perhaps best known now for its poor handling of Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans, it has served as the point agency for every natural disaster the United States has dealt with since its inception.

Emergency Management Cycle

While the methods for emergency management vary, one of the commonly accepted tools is the emergency management cycle. The cycle’s origins go back to the 1930s when phases were first used to describe the ideal response to a disaster. The cycle gained its central place in the emergency management lexicon in 1979 when FEMA was created by President Jimmy Carter following recommendations from the National Governors Association, and versions have now expanded to other nations. This cycle is generally broken into three or four parts, although newer variations can include more steps. Usually the four steps are mitigation, preparedness, response, and recovery. You can see an example here.

The first two phases, mitigation and preparedness, actually occur before the potential disaster strikes. In the preparedness and mitigation phases a country plans for a potential disaster through steps such as developing evacuation plans, raising awareness and improving current infrastructure.

Once the disaster actually strikes, there’s a response section of the cycle. During this time, emergency management workers attempt to rescue people, provide basic services, and prevent any further damage. The final phase is recovery. In this final stage, once the disaster has passed, authorities go to work returning basic services to full operational capabilities. Additionally, infrastructure and other institutions that were damaged during the devastation are rebuilt.

While these distinctions seem clear, steps often overlap and become blurred, further complicating the process. In addition, it’s important to remember that these steps apply equally to both man-made and natural disasters. However, maintaining an appropriate balance of preparedness for the two types is important, otherwise one can become neglected at the expense of the other. A chilling example is the focus on defending against terrorism in the United States that left other shortcomings unnoticed. Critics claim this led to an underfunding of the levee system in New Orleans, which ultimately failed during Hurricane Katrina and had devastating results.

The Finger Pointers and the 20/20 Crowd

Unfortunately not every country has such a system or even a plan in place, including Nepal. These programs are very expensive. For example, in 2015 FEMA’s requested budget was $10.4 billion. To put that into context, Nepal’s entire GDP for 2013, the most recent year available from the World Bank, was only $19.3 billion. While no one expects Nepal to have an agency or program on the scale of FEMA given the lower population and wealth gap between it and U.S., in the wake of this disaster, concerns have arisen that the nation was unprepared.

These considerations did not stop the criticism from pouring about the failure of the Nepalese government. These criticisms have come from several high profile sources, including numerous relief agencies, namely the United Nations. Criticisms range from insufficient infrastructure to the difficulty aid groups have delivering supplies to those who need them. Despite the disaster, many protective tariffs are still in place, making it difficult to distribute goods. There are also concerns over widespread corruption and the reported looting of supply convoys by authorities who want to disperse the aid along ethnic lines.

These criticisms should not be entirely surprising given Nepal’s governmental history. The country only just began recovering from a civil war in 2006, which had lasted ten years. That conflict pitted the newly established democratic government against Maoist insurgents. Since the end of the civil war, there have been a succession of ineffectual governments who have been unable to create any sort of a unified front. For example, in January 2015, the current government was unable to agree on changes to its constitution because of political infighting.  The video below depicts many of the issues facing Nepal’s relief efforts:

International Community

When countries such as Nepal and others suffer a horrendous disaster, the international community usually steps up to aid them in their suffering. While variations of aid can be separated into many different branches, the two clearest distinctions are financial and direct intervention.

Financial Assistance

While not every country has an emergency response team to spare to help in a disaster zone, many can offer another valuable commodity: money. As of April 28^th 60 million dollars in financial assistance had already been pledged to the earthquake ravaged area. This type of giving is not surprising, especially following natural disasters such as earthquakes. In fact two other examples, the deadly 2013 typhoon in the Philippines, and the 2008 cyclone in Myanmar (Burma) illustrate that in circumstances such as these, it is not uncommon for the aid a country receives to as much as quintuple from one year to the next.

Although this is good news for Nepal, it may not be enough. While financial pledges can be easily won in the immediate aftermath of a disaster, the ability to continue to elicit them tends to fade as the story does from the headlines. Costs to repair the damage in Nepal have been estimated to be as much as five billion dollars. This massive undertaking is especially difficult for a nation like Nepal whose GDP, as previously mentioned, is only around 20 billion total each year, with a significant portion of that coming from now-lost tourist revenue.

In addition to these considerations, a working paper on the political economy of disaster preparedness by Charles Cohen and Eric Werker of the Harvard Business School also raises additional considerations. While money is useful in dealing with a disaster, giving away large sums reduces the incentive of a government to be adequately prepared in the first place. According to the study, rich countries as well as poor would be better off if more aid was provided for preparedness than response–it’s smarter to be proactive than reactive.

Concerns also abound over a dishonest government stealing aid money. In some cases, leaders want to reward their constituents first in order to maintain their good graces. Thus, it is also imperative in these types of situations to have a decentralized aid distribution system as much as possible. The video below provides some dos and don’ts in regards to helping following a disaster:

Physical Intervention

Another means to assist an ailing nation is through direct assistance by countries and private organizations. In the case of Nepal, this aid can be divided into three sub-categories. First, countries such as Japan and Australia sent experts and aid teams to help recovery. Relief organizations such as the Red Cross provided money and experts to help, basically serving as microcosms of the nations they represent. Lastly corporations such as Coca-Cola and Kellogg provided bottled water and food to satiate survivors whose access to basic goods may have vanished in the wake of the disaster.

Like financial assistance, direct intervention can also have drawbacks. An example of this comes from the 2010 Haitian earthquake. In that case, relief efforts were hampered and stagnated due to an inefficient infrastructure in place. The United States took full control of the response efforts, at one point legally taking possession of the main airport in the capital Port-au-Prince during the relief efforts. However, subsequent American prioritizing of its own relief planes over other nations’ led to an international row that threatened to divert focus from the main crisis as hand. The accompanying video depicts the controversy:

The Wealth of Nations

Additionally the acceptance of aid either through financial aid or direct intervention can also be influenced by the existing wealth of a nation. For example, while Nepal is basically dependent on other countries for assistance, richer nations who are less beholden may refuse aid when it is offered. A prime example is the United States, which politely declined nearly one billion dollars in aid from allies following Hurricane Katrina in 2005. While part of this was due to government inefficiency in distributing assistance, most offers were simply declined out of hand.

The U.S. declined most of the aid because, while it was adept at distributing aid to other countries, it was less skilled at dispensing aid within its own.  Thus rather than accept more aid that would often spoil or remain unclaimed, it instead declined many offers.  While this stagnation is criticized in other countries as a result of underdeveloped agencies, in the U.S. it was accepted because the U.S. is perceived as being a more capable nation due to its relative wealth.

Conclusion

Although countries such as Nepal and Haiti may serve as examples of how not to handle a disaster, there is no telling how any nation will respond once it actually experiences one. The prime example here is the United States. Even with its large bureaucracy dedicated to disaster relief and readiness, with an equally large budget, the U.S. has repeatedly been accused of being unprepared.

There are numerous examples of these failings, perhaps the two most glaring in recent memory are Hurricane Katrina and Hurricane Sandy. Hurricane Katrina essentially wiped out one of the most historic cities in the US, New Orleans, while also killing over a 1000 people and causing over $135 billion dollars in damage. Hurricane Sandy saw a lower fatality count, approximately 100 dead, but saw major parts of eastern states such as New York and New Jersey effected to the point of $50 billion dollars in damages.

Disasters, whether they are man made or natural, can strike anywhere, anytime. While some nations, either through financial means or previous experience are more prepared than others, ultimately no nation is ever ready for something as deadly as Nepal’s earthquake or a massive hurricane. This is a global issue, and one that has no easy answer.

Resources

Primary

FEMA: The Four Phases of Emergency Management

World Bank: Nepal

Ottawa County Sheriffs’ Office: Four Phases of Emergency Management

Central Intelligence Agency: World Factbook Nepal

Additional

Time: These are the Five Facts That Explain Nepal’s Devastating Earthquake

Brookings: Counter-Terrorism and Emergency Management Keeping a Proper Balance

MNMK: Disaster Management – A Theoretical Approach

VOA: Nepal Officials Slammed Over Aid Response

Fierce Homeland Security: 2015 Budget Request

Harvard Business School: The Political Economy of Natural Disasters

CNN Money: Nepal Earthquake Donations, Who’s Sending What

Vanderbilt Center for Transportation Research: The Phases of Emergency Management

Guardian: US Accused of Annexing Airport as Squabbling Hinders Aid Effort in Haiti

Washington Post: Most Katrina Aid from Overseas went Unclaimed

The Data Center: Fact for Features Katrina Impact

Michael Sliwinski

Michael Sliwinski (@MoneyMike4289) is a 2011 graduate of Ohio University in Athens with a Bachelor’s in History, as well as a 2014 graduate of the University of Georgia with a Master’s in International Policy. In his free time he enjoys writing, reading, and outdoor activites, particularly basketball. Contact Michael at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post How Do Nations Respond When Disaster Strikes? appeared first on Law Street.

It’s been two-and-a-half years since Hurricane Sandy last dominated headlines, but recently the storm has been pulled back into the media. From the 60 Minutes special “The Storm After the Storm,” to this funny yet poignant spot on “The Daily Show with Jon Stewart,” and an article in last week’s edition of The New York Times have all described problems along the road to recovery.

Some residents of the New York/New Jersey area who received the brunt of the hurricane’s wrath are still waiting to receive full compensation for their damaged homes and businesses. Daily Show correspondent Jordan Klepper created a satirical news package that brought to light the struggles of one Staten Island neighborhood. The spot revealed that victims of Hurricane Sandy are still waiting to receive money to rebuild their destroyed houses. One woman explained that she was frustrated because organizations such as “Build It Back” lose paperwork and do not do enough to help affected communities.

The coverage on “60 Minutes” attributed the delayed or missing compensation to intentionally doctored paperwork, claiming there is evidence that insurance and engineering companies often falsified reports. In one example, a company claimed that the damage caused by the storm was long-term damage that existed before the hurricane rolled into town, even though paperwork from a previous visit to the home determined the damage was due to the storm. The resident maintained that the damage was indeed caused by the events of Hurricane Sandy, producing evidence of the paperwork from the original visit.

How is FEMA reacting to all this hoopla? Well, the organization will be reviewing every flood insurance claim filed by homeowners affected by Hurricane Sandy. FEMA’s message was announced by Senators Charles Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand of New York, along with Senators Robert Menendez and Cory Booker, Tweeter Extraordinaire, of New Jersey. (Seriously though, check out Senator Booker’s on-point Twitter account here).

Along with reviewing every flood insurance claim, FEMA will also be launching its own internal inquiry. While all of these reviews and inquiries sound great in theory, there is still not a concrete plan of attack as to when (or how) Sandy victims will be compensated. Steve Mostyn, the lead lawyer representing New York homeowners, remained cautiously optimistic:

We are happy that FEMA now agrees to reopen all Sandy claims. However, that process has not been worked out and the details of that process will determine if it is real or just window dressing.

Hurricane Sandy caused 117 deaths and more than $60 billion worth of damage, second only to Hurricane Katrina in 2005. If America does not improve its process for addressing national disasters, what will happen to homeowners seeking compensation in the future? How many years will they have to wait to rebuild? Is the United States ill-equipped to handle the aftermath of the next deadly tornado in Nebraska, or future large-scale fire in California? Hurricane Sandy might have been an East Coast problem, but fair–and timely–post-storm compensation is a national issue.

Corinne Fitamant

Corinne Fitamant is a graduate of Fordham College at Lincoln Center where she received a Bachelors degree in Communications and a minor in Theatre Arts. When she isn’t pondering issues of social justice and/or celebrity culture, she can be found playing the guitar and eating chocolate. Contact Corinne at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

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Folks, today marks the one-year anniversary of Hurricane Sandy.

Last year, on October 28^th, I walked to a nearby pub called Onieals to grab dinner for me and my wife (then fiancée). Onieals has the best burgers in Hoboken, and I figured it would be our last opportunity to eat meat for awhile.

The storm was supposed to roll in that night. As I walked the three blocks to pick up our order, it was dark, cold, and cloudy, the wind biting sharply against my sweater. The streets were eerily empty. Back at home, we had stocked up on cases of bottled water and plenty of non-perishable food. The whole town waited with baited breath for the worst.

Finally made it to the grocery store to stock up. No more bread. Who needs bread anyway? Too many carbs. #Sandy pic.twitter.com/lF8iJPBG

— Casper Andreas (@CasperAndreas1) October 28, 2012

As it turns out, the storm didn’t hit until the next day. From morning until night on the 29^th, my wife and I watched the local news, our heat cranked up, making the most of our final electricity-filled hours. We watched as the storm submerged Atlantic City, working its way up the coast. Rain pelted our windows. The lights stayed on.

Until they didn’t. Around 9 p.m., I took a peek out of our bedroom window, hearing screams from outside. The streets were empty. All was well.

Then, ten minutes later, when the screams got louder, I looked again. All of a sudden, there was three feet of water in the street, and rising. Our car was floating. Our apartment building—and all the buildings around us—became an island in a sea of gasoline-tinged floodwaters. The lights went out. My wife and I huddled in bed, trying to block out the screams of thousands of car alarms blaring outside. It sounded like the end of the world.

Morning came, and the water was higher. Firemen paddled through the streets on inflatable boats, looking for people to rescue. I called out to them from our open window, asking if there were any evacuation orders. No, they told me, stay where you are. It took my wife and I days just to get out of our third-floor apartment—the flood waters filled the first floor of our building, along with an array of garbage it had washed in, blocking our exit.

Taken by yours truly, from our apartment window.

On day three, the waters in our neighborhood had drained. Stir crazy, we went outside to survey our destroyed car. We took a walk through the town, detouring around the areas that still hadn’t drained. Every basement and ground floor apartment in town was destroyed. Every car was totaled. Abandoned ambulances floated in the middle of flooded streets, signaling failed rescue attempts.

Once again, taken by yours truly.

FEMA set up camp downtown, and volunteers from around the world gathered to help. Wealthier residents, who paid to live on higher ground, offered their newly recovered electricity to the public, stringing power strips out of their front windows. They served hot food and drinks while strangers—including us—charged their phones at their front doors.

My wife and I had no power for 8 days. We lost our car. Our apartment was so cold, we spent most of our time huddled together, napping under mountains of blankets, trying to ignore the visibility of our breath. When the heat came back on, we both nearly cried for joy.

That was a year ago, and we were pretty lucky. Tons of other Hoboken residents lost everything. Our families in southern New Jersey lost a lot of things too. And those epic photos you’ve seen of the destroyed boardwalks along the Jersey Shore? That’s where we grew up. Things still aren’t quite the same.

Since the storm, I like to joke that we’ve all come down with PTSD—Post Traumatic Sandy Disorder. Nowadays, we all sleep with a flashlight on the nightstand, with an extra tank of gas in the garage, with a zillion spare batteries in the fridge. The sound of car alarms still makes me want to hide under the covers. And the word hurricane strikes a new kind of fear into our hearts.

But the fact is, while we were all deeply affected by Hurricane Sandy, memorializations of tragedies like these tend to gloss over the realities of wealth inequality and marginalization. I’ve stumbled across countless stories detailing the destruction of the storm, and the resilience of communities who are rebuilding and bouncing back. But that ability to bounce back isn’t the same for everyone.

I’ve written before about how women, queers, and people of color are more likely to struggle with poverty. So, let’s take a wild guess as to who was hit hardest by a storm like this, and who would have the most difficulty recovering afterwards?

In Hoboken, it was easy to see. This city is basically a tiny microcosm—it’s an incredibly small town geographically, but it’s filled to the brim with people, spatially divided by race and socioeconomic class.

The projects and low-income housing options are located in the lowest section of town—that means that the poorest people experienced the worst flooding, and went without power for the longest period of time. By contrast, there’s a whole other neighborhood that’s filled with multimillion-dollar condos—unsurprisingly, their elevated position meant they experienced the least flooding, and lost power for all of (maybe) 24 hours.

Not to mention, early childhood education programs and local emergency healthcare—all crucial services for the economically disadvantaged—were completely destroyed in the storm. These facilities were closed unceremoniously, and no alternatives were provided. Many of them have only just reopened, if they’ve managed to do so at all. Add that to the reality that many of the folks affected by these closings could have easily lost their cars, homes, and jobs in the storm, and you’ve got a situation that’s overwhelmingly difficult to get out of.

A destroyed Hoboken basement apartment, next door to our building.

My wife and I were lucky. We lost plenty, but neither of our jobs were destroyed in the storm, we had good insurance coverage, and a healthy savings account. We had the economic resources and infrastructure to rebuild our lives post-Sandy, and these days, things are pretty much back to normal.

But we’re white, college-educated, working to middle-class women. We have a certain level of privilege that tipped the scales in our favor. Not everyone has that. And as a result, not everyone could bounce back from this storm as well as we did.

So this Halloween season, while you’re reading all of these post-Sandy retrospectives in the news, think critically about who the storm affected and how. Is there something you can do to help those who haven’t been able to bounce back—and who, likely, haven’t been featured in the upbeat, restore the shore narrative?

Because when economic disadvantage is a problem before a tragedy like this happens, it’s not always so easy to pick up the pieces afterwards.

—

Hannah R. Winsten (@HannahRWinsten) is a freelance copywriter, marketing consultant, and blogger living in New York’s sixth borough. She hates tweeting but does it anyway. She aspires to be the next Rachel Maddow.

Images courtesy of [Hannah R. Winsten]

Hannah R. Winsten

Hannah R. Winsten is a freelance copywriter, marketing consultant, and blogger living in New York’s sixth borough. She hates tweeting but does it anyway. She aspires to be the next Rachel Maddow. Contact Hannah at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

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