When an earthquake hits a war zone or cyclone aid is flown in by
an enemy, many ask: Can catastrophe bring peace? Disaster
prevention and mitigation provide similar questions. Could setting
up a flood warning system bring enemy countries together? Could a
regional earthquake building code set the groundwork for wider
regional cooperation?
This book examines how and why disaster-related activities do and
do not create peace and reduce conflict. Disaster-related
activities refer to actions before a disaster such as prevention
and mitigation along with actions after a disaster such as
emergency response, humanitarian relief, and reconstruction. This
volume investigates disaster diplomacy case studies from around the
world, in a variety of political and disaster circumstances, from
earthquakes in Greece and Turkey affecting these neighbours'
bilateral relations to volcanoes and typhoons influencing
intra-state conflict in the Philippines. Dictatorships are amongst
the case studies, such as Cuba and Burma, along with democracies
such as the USA and India. No evidence is found to suggest that
disaster diplomacy is a prominent factor in conflict resolution.
Instead, disaster-related activities often influence peace
processes in the short-term-over weeks and months-provided that a
non-disaster-related basis already existed for the reconciliation.
That could be secret negotiations between the warring parties or
strong trade or cultural links. Over the long-term,
disaster-related influences disappear, succumbing to factors such
as a leadership change, the usual patterns of political enmity, or
belief that an historical grievance should take precedence over
disaster-related bonds.
This is the first book on disaster diplomacy. Disaster-politics
interactions have been studied for decades, but usually from a
specific political framing, covering a specific geographical area,
or from a specific disaster framing. As well, plenty of
quantitative work has been completed, yet the data limitations are
rarely admitted openly or thoroughly analysed. Few publications
bring together the topics of disasters and politics in terms of a
disaster diplomacy framework, yielding a grounded, qualitative,
scientific point of view on the topic.
General
Is the information for this product incomplete, wrong or inappropriate?
Let us know about it.
Does this product have an incorrect or missing image?
Send us a new image.
Is this product missing categories?
Add more categories.
Review This Product
No reviews yet - be the first to create one!