Disaster Seminar Series: Is Disaster Risk Creation more significant than risk reduction?

Topic: Is Disaster Risk Creation more significant than risk reduction?

Speakers: Terry Cannon, emeritus senior research fellow, Institute of Development Studies at University of Sussex

Abstract: Most work (research and practice) in disaster risk reduction (DRR) is based on the assumption that it reduces vulnerability or mitigate hazards. Research is supposedly ‘taken up’ by governments and relevant institutions and used to inform DRR policy. Donors, NGOs and other actors supposedly engage in activities that reduce disaster risk.

Cannon will discuss his paper which upsets these comforting assumptions. It argues that government and the private sector are much more likely to create disasters than to reduce them. The argument that Disaster Risk Creation (DRC) is more significant than the efforts of academics and organizations to reduce disasters is of course controversial. But in the context of a global economy, dominated by the ideology of neo-liberalism, Cannon will argue that a great deal more honesty is needed in how academia relates to the problems of disaster creation.

The presentation examines the concept of Damage to Cure Ratio (D:C), which assesses the difference between finance and activities that are supposed to reduce disaster impacts (the ‘cure’) and the resources that are used to make vulnerability worse, to increase global warming, and to expose more people to natural hazards.

We encourage everyone to attend the seminar in-person but participants can also join online:

https://yorku.zoom.us/j/95792639115?pwd=8f4taWcHtfWarFChbMbJD8NpTQH7sP.1

Meeting ID: 957 9263 9115

Passcode: 451025