Rebuilding sustainable communities for children and their families after disasters

Diane Levin

“Understanding the Impact of Disasters on Children and
Helping Them Heal and Thrive Afterwards”

Using stories collected from around the world about how children make sense of and respond to exposure to disasters, Diane Levin will show how children’s experiences affect their behavior, needs, and developing ideas. She will also explore what the stories can teach us about meeting children’s needs, counteracting the negative effects, working with families and promoting more positive development and behavior when disaster strikes.

Tutty Alawiyah

Rebuilding sustainable communities for children orphaned by the 2004 Aceh Tsunami: The Case of As-Syafi`iyah Special Boarding School for Orphans

Having sympathy and love to, and taking good care of, the orphans to be appropriately educated so as to lead them towards independent, and self-reliant adult life is a good deed of great significance to Moslems.

Since the 10th of January 1978, Dr. Tutty Alawiyah, had run the orphanage and made it home for orphans in one complex of 3.5 hectares of land. This is an example of determined commitment to her life-long cause of teaching, feeding and training poor orphans free of charge.

Over the last thirty years, thousands of orphaned children have been saved from ignorance and from conditions of being un-attended and un-cared for, granting them a chance at a better life. This special Pesantren (Islamic Boarding School for the orphans) is the development of the concept of panti asuhan (an institution for the care of the less fortunate children) into a better one of Special Pesantren for Orphans, which has now currently become the home of the orphans.

The Tsunami disaster of December 26, 2004, hit many Asian countries hard and hit Aceh, an area on the Indonesian island of Sumatra, the hardest. Dr. Alawiyah was suddenly entrusted with the care of hundreds of Tsunami survivors.

There were about 307 children orphans from all over Indonesia. And in the aftermath of the tsunami disaster, Dr. Alawiyah has hosted about 500 children altogether. These children live and study in the orphanage. Currently, in 2008, there are still remaining 60 Aceh tsunami victims who are still continuing there study in the orphanage, while the rest have completed there studies and returned back to Aceh, along with 320 other orphans, some of whom are also victims of riots and natural disasters that have hit Indonesia.

The paper highlights how to deal with children who are victims of disasters, in many aspects based on the author’s personal and real experiences.

Michael Donlan

Energy as a Compounding Disaster Component

Whenever disaster inflicts itself upon a community and whenever a community prepares itself to minimize the devastation to be visited by a disaster, the issue of energy is an important one to factor in; and, more specifically: -- the price, -- the usage, -- the emissions and -- the accessibility of energy are each becoming chronic disasters in-the-making – whether compounding an existing disaster or constituting stand-alone disasters.

Disasters are increasing in frequency and intensity. And, while we typically think of disasters as being caused haphazardly and anecdotally -- by forces of nature and affecting local regions; an increasing and presaging source of disasters are self-inflicted and multi-compounding -- having worldwide impact. Today Global society faces an historic/apocalyptic, self-inflicted foursome: -- a full financial disaster, -- climatic disasters, -- proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and -- a permanent decline in Global oil supplies. Many, if not all, of these accelerate the disastrous impact of each other. Global society appears to be approaching critical mass. This is a full societal challenge; and it must be met by an all-hands response led by visionaries.

As the Center for Rebuilding Sustainable Communities After Disasters advances our state of knowledge and professionalism to respond – on regional and local scenes – to disasters, an overbearing battery of self-inflicted disasters will influence (and hamper) our abilities to anticipate and our capabilities to respond – anywhere on the Globe. This paper uses energy as a point of focus and a point of entrée to penetrate into these interrelated, self-inflicted and far-reaching disasters.

In United States, where energy is consumed in vast quantities and is essential for the continuity of its economy, a massive shift of capital is exiting out of the United States (simply to pay for a single imported commodity: oil); and that financial capital is just as necessary for the continuity of its economy as energy itself. Conversely, in developing nations the price of energy had reached levels that make the purchase thereof prohibitive to the average person (and then dropped precipitously by half). And, in all parts of the Globe, the overall amount of usage of energy is having an increasingly detrimental impact on Global Warming.

And there are worse prospects portending. Many experts predict that the supply of crude oil is approaching its ‘Peak Oil’ moment. Yet the demand for oil is increasing without any limit in sight. Global supply of oil is increasing only linearly (at best); and worse, most major oil sources have already peaked in production. Such demand is exceeding supply for a strategic product, which has a lack of demand elasticity; and hence pricing will be chronically problematic. Energy is about to become (if not already) a major contributor to geopolitical tension and conflict.

Visionary leadership is mandated to abate demand growth; but the United States continues to be a disappointment – at the federal level. In contrast, the State of Massachusetts has just undertaken a bold new program designed to abate much of these energy-related disasters; and so too California. Such leadership must be replicated by other states – to counter the tepid national response. Impressive leadership on the state level can help to prompt serious improvement in our national energy policy, which is vital if energy use is to ever become sustainable.

These problems never existed before – as the price of energy had been cheap and supply abundant (in the last century) and, per force, costs had been steadily declining. No longer. Prices gyrated (in the last year) to heights un-thought-of; while, in recent days, such price tumbled by half. Some normality must be fashioned. Here in the United States we can make a first recourse to energy efficiency as a means to abate demand -- by retrofitting our obsolete energy consumption systems. A normative 20% can be saved readily. And many new technologies - for example, wireless retrofitting - make the cost of saving energy only a fourth of the cost of purchase of energy at retail. Such first step must be followed by a series of steps to make energy usage sustainable – principally by the use of clean, renewable fuel.

As this paper is being presented, too many self-inflicted disasters are raining down on the Globe. The United States stands as the principal causer; and energy is a principal instrumental cause. The Global economic system is stumbling badly at the very same time that energy has become a highly problematic disaster-compounding ingredient (on several levels): -- financial burden, -- credit collapse, -- resource depletion, and -- Global Warming. A ‘perfect storm.’ Political and economic remedies - that had classically been resorted to in such severe crises - had always been nation-based; (and such issues had arisen seriatim, not all at once). But these self-inflicted disasters are essentially Global. And from whence our remedies and leadership? Political leaders have been wonting, international collaboration has always been problematical, and the public is not even being warned (or even apprised) sufficiently.

A sound scenario for solution is in the offing – if our leaders will lead. It is a win/win/ win. Start off by reducing demand by a ready 20%, by way of energy efficiency and demand-side response (including new CAFE standards at 50 mpg). Then shift to supply-side response by accelerating usage of renewable and clean fuels, starting with wind and solar (photovoltaic). And accelerate development of bio-fuels. Moreover, such demand-side and supply-side industries will keep our disappearing capital here at home and be used to pay a new cadre of workers and entrepreneurs.

Nicole Flore

“Social and Economic Mobility for the Roma in Hungary: A Look at Government Initiatives and International Responses”

While many groups in Hungary have benefited from economic modernization and development, others, such as the Roma, have not benefited as much from these advances.  The Roma are the largest minority in Europe and in post-Communist countries, such as Hungary, are known as the biggest ‘losers’ of the change from Communism to capitalism because of the loss of governmental welfare programs. Currently, in Hungary the Roma face obstacles and challenges in access to healthcare, education, employment, and adequate housing. However, over the past decade the European Union and the Hungarian government have taken steps to promote anti-discrimination legislation and social programs focusing on equality and diversity.  Additionally, international non-governmental organizations have also played an important role in minority rights in Central and Eastern Europe providing advocacy, resources, and policy development.

Beryl Cheal

“The Role of Schools in Rebuilding
Sustainable Communities after Disasters”

Rebuilding sustainable communities for children and their families after disasters should have two components directly involving schools. First, the community needs a useable, site-specific preparedness plan which could be developed by schools in conjunction with the wider community, in which risks have been mitigated and participants know what they will do and where they will go when disaster strikes. Second, schools must plan how to help children and their families recover from the traumatic experiences that often accompany disaster.

Why should there be preparedness plans? Oxfam America (Oxfam) reports that communities which have implemented risk-reduction (or preparedness) plans sustain less damage during disaster, than communities without such planning. The negative impact of disasters can be significantly reduced with proper planning and training. Residents recover more rapidly, fewer lives are lost, children and the community are more resilient. In addition, Save the Children, Sweden (Save the Children) has demonstrated that children’s taking the lead in the development of risk reduction/preparedness plans assists in their mental and emotional post-disaster recovery.

How can schools help? Schools are in a unique position to provide children with structure and continuity in their lives, so necessary pre- and post-disaster. With training staff can give necessary leadership to ensure preparedness plans are child centered. They have the obligation to assist children, for schools are entrusted with children’s care and safety for a major portion of the weekday. Schools should also design a program that can assist children to recover and heal, whether or not they show outward signs of trauma and loss. (Cheal)

This paper will describe how children can become involved in developing preparedness plans, and outline how they and their families may get assistance at school, post-disaster, to help them regain balance in their lives.

Grace Oyebola Adetula

“Female Ex-Child Soldiers: Case Studies for East and West Africa”

Young females sometimes are abducted, forced and conscripted into armies, militias and rebel groups to fight wars before they develop and mature physically, emotionally, socially, and psychologically. This amounts to child labor, a violation of fundamental human rights and represents a war crime. Though it is at variance with international humanitarian and human rights laws and conventions, is common around the world. The overhead cost of this catastrophe is quite high and with dire consequences. The female child soldiers are ‘acculturated’ into warfare, garbed in camouflage as combatants, subjected to symbolic manifestations that are exploitative and dehumanizing, and are deprived of all their beautiful, delicate, and intricately dynamic development before, during, and even after the conflicts.

In most cases, reintegration and rehabilitation processes do not significantly tackle the common issues of this group nor does it implicitly ensure that the female ex-child soldier is properly reintegrated and rehabilitated such that the usual stigmatization and marginalization by the family and community are negated. The often debilitating physical and psychological trauma suffered by female ex-child soldiers are never addressed and human rights abuses never receive ticker tape mention at the reintegration phase which further worsens their socio-economic conditions, especially if they are disabled.

This paper offers intensive analysis of rehabilitation and reintegration processes for female ex-child soldiers in Uganda, in East Africa, and Liberia and Sierra Leone, in West Africa, emphasizing their special needs in post-conflict situations and acknowledging the importance of social control in reintegrating them into the mainstream of the society to ensure community safety and wealth. The paper will, therefore, examine various reintegration processes, the roles of International organizations and NGOs, community, and the family, explore lessons learned from the case studies, and propose some recommendations.

The Rev. Jonathan Wortmann
The Rev. Bob Bachelder
and
The Rev. Paul Block

Three Answers to Urban Poverty: Consistent Leadership, Organizational
Partnerships, and Faith Community Involvement

When engaging the ongoing disaster of poverty in America, a qualitative study of three urban environments in America—New Orleans, LA, South Bronx, NY, and Worcester, MA—reveal three factors which facilitate sustainable environments for children and their families in urban America: Consistent leadership, organizational partnerships, and faith community involvement. The 1970’s saw all three cities experience steep declines in population and industry; but today, the recovery of the South Bronx and the ongoing successful redevelopment in Worcester stand in painful contrast to the ongoing devastation in New Orleans following the 2005 flooding. The narratives of the individuals and communities who have rebuilt in New York and Massachusetts as well as the initial efforts of the courageous in New Orleans offer insight into the commitments that create opportunities for the poor and transform cities one neighborhood at a time.

Elsie-Bernadette Onubogu

The Challenges of Conflict and Post-Conflict: Women’s Perspectives

By the end of 2003, there were at least twenty-three (23) armed conflicts around the world with nearly two-thirds of them in Africa, Asia and the Pacific. A majority of today’s conflicts take place within countries, between different ethnic and socio-economic groups, with civilians constituting major targets and often participating as willing or coerced combatants. These conflicts which, have moved into villages, communities and homes dominate the global agenda and sometimes attrac t what has been sarcastically referred to as the “CNN or Christiane Amanpour moment”, have differential impacts on men, women, girls and boys. From the outset, it must be stated that despite the impact of conflicts on women, they are active agents of peace and have been known to broker peace even where men have failed.

For instance, while more men are killed or die during conflicts, majority of women and girls are targets and have been subjected to sexual violence, sexual assault, sexual slavery and exploitation including trafficking of persons and human rights violations, impunity, and the use of rape as a weapon of war as was evidenced by the ethnic cleansing in the former Yugoslavia in cities such as Srebrenica, Vukovar, Bosnia and Kosovo to mention a few. In other conflicts such as northern Uganda and Sierra Leone, the impact has taken the form of abducting child soldiers, mutilation and amputation of limbs – crudely referred by the rebels as ‘short sleeve or long sleeve’. In other silent yet protracted wars such as those in the Middle East and Sri Lanka, young females are conscripted and used as ‘suicide bombers’, a phenomenon that is barely, reported nor addressed.

In some other rare yet scarcely reported cases, women engage in combat fighting willingly or aid those perpetrating violence against the civilian community, such as was the case in some Latin American countries or Rwanda, where a former Minister for Women Affairs, Mme. Pauline Nyiramasuhuko, who is accused of orchestrating a trap in the village of Butare, where she promised besieged residents food and shelter in a local stadium; upon their arrival refugees where raped, tortured, and killed (Zimbardo, 2007). Nyiramasuhuko is said to have told militiamen "before you kill the women, you need to rape them". Against this background, women are often reported as ‘victims' of war and conflicts. Unfortunately, presenting women as “mere victims”, does not present the full story, as women have and continue to make positive contributions during and in the aftermath of conflicts.

For instance, women led by Helen Hakena of the Leitana Nehan Women’s Development Agency (LNWDA), played a key role in bringing men from opposing sides to the peace table in Bougainville, where attempts at secession from Papua New Guinea had brought about more than a decade of violent conflict. In the Solomon Islands, more than a hundred women from the islands of Guadalcanal and Malaita – whose men folk were fighting each other – came together in the capital, Honiara, to talk about how the conflict had affected them and called for peace. So determined were the women of Malaita that they braved rough seas in a boat to get to the talks.

Despite these roles, challenges and impact of conflict on women, in nearly all the conflicts, women are rarely part of the formal processes of negotiation for peace, neither are they allowed access to post-conflict agreements and reconstruction processes. In a few cases where women have become part of the negotiation and post-conflict processes, their participation has come only after long arduous lobbying, in some cases, requiring the intervention of global public figure such as Nelson Mandela, who willingly negotiated and integrated women’s concerns into the Arusha Peace Agreement for Burundi women.

The paper will review the roles and contributions of women in conflict and post-conflict situations. In addition the challenges and impact of conflict on women and societies in general will be highlighted. Furthermore, the paper will argue despite the fact that women stand in the majority of those affected by conflicts, women continue to make positive contributions (though rarely documented), yet, they continue to be denied access in peace negotiations such as is the case in the Darfur crisis.

Despite these challenges, the former United Nations Secretary General, Mr. Kofi Annan has noted that “in war-torn societies, women often keep societies going. They maintain the social fabric. They replace destroyed social services and tend to the sick and wounded. As a result, women are the prime advocates of peace (Kofi Annan, 2000). Thus, women’s contributions are not only critical but central to achievement of peace in societies.

Some Strategies for the Promotion of Human Dignity for Rebuilding Sustainable Communities after Disasters

Disaster management occupies an important place in one’s country’s institutional and policy framework as it is for the poor and underprivileged who were worst affected on account of calamities/disasters/hazards/accidents. Many disasters make people loose their lives, their properties, their dear ones, etc. The economic and social damage, as well as the loss in terms of individual, community, private and public assets have been astronomical. The paper identifies the areas which are vulnerable to disasters on account of their unique economic, social, technical, geo-climatic conditions. Over the past few years, there has been a paradigm shift in the approach to disaster management for rebuilding sustainable communities. The new approach proceeds from the conviction that development cannot be sustainable unless disaster mitigation is built into a ‘multi disciplinary and multi sectoral’ process and that the corner stone is “the part to whole” and “the whole to part.”

The paper highlights the status of children and women in various communities after disasters, based on the author’s personal and real experiences. It also explores the roles of governments, the private sector, non-governmental organizations and Rotary International in rebuilding the communities.

The paper recommends future policy formulation and implementation processes by local, regional and national governments as well as multilateral agencies and grass-roots organizations. It also suggests some approaches/strategies for the promotion of human dignity in the creation of sustainable environments that empower families in the aftermath of disasters and how to reconstruct sustainable communities that will be safe for children and their families after disasters.

Hurricane Katrina: The Reliant City Story

Although the American Red Cross was initially assigned the volunteer effort, due to the enormity of the situation they were unable to coordinate and maintain the ever-changing and growing need for volunteer support. On the evening of September 1st, Incident Command stated that the need for an organized volunteer effort to help support the numerous agencies on-site providing services to the evacuees was urgent. Harris County immediately activated the resources of the Harris County Citizen Corps to set up and maintain the Volunteer Unit. The Citizen Corps successfully partnered with the Joint Information Center to mobilize and organize the thousands of volunteers who sought to provide the help necessary to create and sustain the multitude of services provided to the evacuees from the Superdome. The volunteers assisted in providing the victims with comfortable, convenient, and safe living accommodations. The massive effort to quickly develop a temporary shelter and sustain operations in the Reliant Park Astrodome Complex required the work of tens of thousands of volunteers and numerous partner organizations. Over 60,000 persons volunteered during the three-week shelter operation.

Gregory D. Squires
and
Chester Hartman

Paper Abstract

This paper draws on the experience of Gulf Coast, Louisiana residents following the August 2005 hurricanes. It will primarily speak to the impact of these events on children and their families, with some attention to proposals for avoiding or minimizing such impacts and to principles for community rebuilding.

The principal focus will be on schooling, health, housing and family relations. Much of the material was first presented in There Is No Such Thing As a Natural Disaster: Race: Class and Hurricane Katrina (Routledge, 2006), co-edited by Chester Hartman, Director of Research at the Poverty & Race Research Action Council, and Gregory Squires of the George Washington Univ. Dept. of Sociology, updated for the chapter they have in Seeking Higher Ground: The Hurricane Katrina Crisis, Race and Public Policy Reader (Palgrave MacMillan, 2008), co-edited by Manning Marable and Kristen Clarke; and further updated for their conference paper and subsequent book, “Reinventing Race, Reinventing Racism: The 40th Anniversary of the Kerner Commission” Forum, June 6, 2008 at the Univ. of Illinois at Chicago.

Lessons to Learn: Roles of Government, Private Sector and NGOs in Disaster Reconstruction in Fragile States and Impoverished Communities

Current US practice in natural and man-made post-disaster rebuilding compels a dialogue toward policy reforms that revitalize rather than re-fracture communities around the world. Faltering, mis-targeted, and over-centralized strategies and approaches cannot achieve positive results in insecure communities and regions. In spite of, or perhaps because of, an expanded field of institutional players whose interests, resources and methods are often incongruous with those of the disaster-impacted community leaders and members trying to maintain their dignity while rebuilding: lessons are difficult to apply.

Yet, even modest improvements can produce a dramatic and positive impact on destroyed or damaged communities.

To discuss reconstruction, we must embrace the community as a whole, including the ethnic, political, religious and other minority populations with rooted identities there. Like women and children, these groups’ vulnerabilities are typically magnified by a disaster. An urban planner, the author fuses physical, social and political elements to create flexible, integrated planning frameworks for building capacities as well as objects. With a vision of community-led recovery, the author shows how outsiders can play a role to facilitate -- without dominating -- fruitful relations (state-civil society, majority-minority) among adversaries to sustain rebuilding, especially in large-scale disasters. Accepting that we are guests in others’ communities, which ultimately control our shared success, is essential.

Civilian and military, private and public, corporate, media, religious, research and other institutions bring potential value to the community theatre, acting at the local, national and global levels. However, foreign resources brought in “to help disaster victims” often do more to destabilize the community and society at risk. International structures and systems can distort or paralyze communities’ natural coping mechanisms. Global standards often discriminate against culturally appropriate and/or economically sustainable solutions developing from within. Donor budget and reporting cycles recurrently disrupt local planning, ignore harder-to-hear voices, and disregard construction seasons. Foreign authorities commonly undermine the legitimacy of the government; aid workers routinely prevent new community leadership from rising.

Such inequitable response creates longer-term vulnerabilities and increased incidents in disasters in the future. We can do better.

Recent US legislation, regulations and programming related to natural and man-made crises has significantly expanded the roles of a variety of institutional actors, particularly in private and public security. Recognizing that protecting vulnerable communities poses a challenge throughout the world, the author argues with examples, that unintended consequences of stepped-up security warrant re-examining our divisive strategies and re-conceiving a more human and sustainable approach. With a lighter hand that respects others’ values, we can initiate and integrate our high-value services across divergent political and social frameworks.

With case illustrations from firsthand field experience in fatal failures and homegrown successes that span thirty countries, the author aims to set the stage for policy makers and leading disaster reconstruction institutions to critically assess, to recast and to revitalize their roles as complementary. To seek commitment to enhance collaboration and communication, which does not weaken institutional competitiveness in the marketplace, but reduces waste of valuable resources, both global and local. Within the context of this conference, the author proposes an innovation of partnerships across sectors and other boundaries to reconstruct communities that are safe and that respect the dignity due to women, children and their families in every culture.

Everybody’s Child: Supporting Children in Emergency Situations

Everybody’s Child is a three year project which focuses on one of the most critical problems of the Twenty First Century: the increasing exposure of children worldwide to armed conflict, natural disasters, extreme poverty, and public health emergencies. The project combines social, cultural, psychological and medical research on catastrophic events and mass trauma and actively engages participants who include elducational and health care professionals as agents of change, in transformative dialogues and projects, supported by technology, for and with children living in areas affected by catastrophic events and on going emergencies. Longitudinal ethnographic and semiotic research is currently being conducted in: (i) Israel, the West Bank and Gaza, and in (ii) St. Bernard Parish, Jefferson Parish, and Baton Rouge, Louisiana which began immediately after Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. Connections have also been established with researchers, humanitarian aide workers and teachers in Haiti, Peru, Rwanda, and Darfur. The research imperative of the basic and applied field research is to heighten awareness of how the combination of medical and educational research can provide much needed information about the ways doctors and teachers can support children in the aftermath of catastrophic events or in on-going emergency situations. The pedagogical imperative is to use this knowledge to actively engage members of the teaching and medical professions in collaborative initiatives that will maximize the possibilities that children who have experienced catastrophic events or live in areas of on-going emergencies will recover and go on to live healthy and productive lives.

Rebuilding after Katrina: New Orleans Before and After the Flood

Rebuilding after Katrina is organized into two parts. First, there will be the showing of the 68-minute film, Fauberg Treme, which premiered in April 2008 at the Tribeca Film Festival. The documentary, which begins with images of destruction in the wake of Katrina, returns to the days when a section of New Orleans, called Treme was young. Located just outside the French Quarter, Treme was first incorporated early in the nineteenth century, and was home to large numbers of free people of color, those born free or those who purchased their freedom. At the center of Treme is Congo Square, where, as early as the eighteenth century, slaves gathered on Sundays to sell their wares, dance, and make music, keeping their spirits and their culture strong. Music is the pulse of New Orleans, and Storyville, a section of Treme is credited as the cradle of jazz and blues. It was also in Treme that the seeds of the Civil Rights Movement sprouted. New Orleans is the heart of Africana Americana, and Treme is the heart of New Orleans. In the film, boys and girls, energetic, undaunted, throng the streets in Treme at the first Mardi Gras since Katrina. The saga of sustained renewal after disaster is clear in the insistent rhythm of the city’s children, who dance with the pulse of yesterday and the beat of today.

Following the film, we will have a panel on contemporary New Orleans with Lolis Eric Elie, a columnist for the Times-Picayune of New Orleans, one of the filmmakers; Branford Marsalis, musician; and Lynnell Thomas, Assistant Professor of American Studies, UMASS Boston, who is completing a book about tourism in New Orleans. Barbara Lewis, Director of the Trotter Institute, UMass Boston, will moderate. Mr. Elie, Mr. Marsalis, and Dr. Thomas are native New Orleanians.

Coping with the Tsunami: Perspectives From Families Of Children With Disabilities In Tamil Nadu, India

This paper presents part of the results of a study commissioned by the Government of Tamil Nadu and United Nations Tsunami Recovery Support in 2007 to Wilbur Smith Associates, to document the impact of the tsunami on people with disabilities; and to evolve strategies for different aspects of disaster management for people with disabilities, with special focus on women and children with disability.

The study used a participatory methodology with quantitative and qualitative data collected from a purposively selected sample, to elicit information on how people with disabilities and their families coped in the immediate aftermath of the disaster; how they accessed immediate and post-disaster relief and reconstruction assistance; the barriers they faced in accessing services; the major service providers who addressed their needs during different stages; the unmet needs; the emotional impact of the tsunami; and their suggestions for disability-specific disaster management strategies. The final sample of 319 people with disabilities from urban, peri-urban and rural communities from 3 districts included 80 children below 14 years and 45 older children/adolescents and adults with mental retardation and multiple disabilities.

The results showed that children with disabilities and their families had the same needs, access to services and barriers to access, as others in the general population. However, they also had certain disability-specific needs and barriers that would need special attention of service providers. The findings of the study led to a set of recommendations for inclusion of people with disabilities and their families in different aspects of disaster management. Most of these recommendations would benefit not only people with disabilities, but also other vulnerable groups like the elderly, pregnant women and women with small children. It would therefore be cost-effective for service providers to take note of these recommendations in addressing different aspects of disaster management in future.

Child participation: a concept to consider in (re) building sustainable communities in disaster prone urban areas

Lessons learnt from Ecuador

This study sets out to assess the role of children in (re)building sustainable communities in disaster prone urban areas. An urban disaster prone settlement in Ecuador was chosen as an intrinsic case, because of its strong focus on child participation (CP) as a central element in community development. A mixed methodology was utilized to systematically analyse the strengths and challenges of employing a child-centred participatory approach to disaster risk reduction.

The first key finding of the study was the common approach chosen by the network of eleven organisations closely cooperating in the area, which stimulated working towards achieving common goals and supported the successful implementation of CP.

Secondly, the community, jointly performed a risk and vulnerability assessment and thereafter the children, adolescents, and adults identified their own solutions, projects and evaluation criteria to tackle the daily hazards and threats. An important milestone reached in a country where children are often the first to be excluded as active members of civil society.

Thirdly, adolescents indicated that through participation they learnt how to convert their visions and ideas into reality by gaining practical skills on how to design and implement projects and realizing the importance of listening, expressing oneself, and cooperating with others. In addition it led to increased levels of; confidence; happiness; feelings of security and usefulness; motivation to learn, family integration and solidarity between adolescents themselves and adults.

The main challenge encountered was to employ and inclusive approach to adolescent participation since empowering youth without ‘doing harm’ requires to work closely with the key (adult) actors of the adolescents social fabric. Finally one should not loose sight of; the vital importance of well-trained field workers; the fact that although children are active actors, they also need to experience childhood and that implementing meaningful CP is a process that will not take place over night.

Nanci Monaco

Factors Associated with Development of Secondary Depression vs. Resiliency Following Hurricane Katrina

For the past 33 months, the author has been a part of a group of international mental health professionals working with displaced families following Hurricane Katrina. These families have been followed through immediate relocation to the New Orleans Convention Center or Superdome and subsequent long-term relocation to various other states. According to many displaced families, depression developed in two stages: primary depression in reaction to the immediate consequences of a natural disaster and secondary depression in reaction to subsequent events. Causes of secondary depression were attributed to: the failed policies of FEMA, difficulties receiving supplies, inappropriate care for first responders (leading many to abdicate their responsibilities to the public), failure to secure temporary shelter, failure to reopen schools in a timely manner, problems with the temporary trailers provided, and massive communication problems and policy changes occurring in the days immediately following Katrina's landfall.

Extensive interviews were conducted with parents of children affected by the Hurricane at various stages of their relocation process, focusing on their perceptions of problems with disaster relief and successful interventions. The Child Behavior Checklist was employed in order to obtain ratings of children's symptomatology. The Beck Depression Scale was employed to obtain ratings of adult depressive symptomatology. Scores on the checklists were examined, along with data from extensive structured interviews, in order to identify factors associated with ongoing depression versus those associated with resiliency and coping. Psychological areas explored included: the attributional style of the individual, his/her perception of control over the various stages in the recovery process, his/her ratings of individual progress made toward personal recovery, his/her ratings of federal, state, or local assistance, his/her perception of concern by other citizens unaffected by the Hurricane for the residents of New Orleans, his/her attribution as to why the levees failed, his/her perception of the role racism may have played in the relief efforts, and the role faith/religion played in personal recovery. Other areas investigated included the ability to find employment, re-enrollment of children in schools, ability to secure appropriate housing, and the establishment of a network of family, friends, religious, or therapeutic supports. Patterns were identified which were associated with resiliency versus ongoing depression. Implications for the delivery of services in ways which promote better psychological health for children and families following natural disasters will be also be discussed.

Partnerships for Children: Save the Children’s Work to Aid Children in Domestic Disasters

There are few emergency management plans that recognize children’s unique needs for safety, protection and recovery in disasters, including mental health, play and physical activity, and the continuity of child care and schooling. Developing sustainable communities after disasters and plans that provide child protection against future emergencies requires building strong partnerships with child care and emergency management organizations. Recognizing this, Save the Children’s Domestic Emergencies Unit has spearheaded programs including city preparedness initiatives and resiliency building programming to address child safety in disasters.

The Tulsa and New York City initiatives serve as two partnership models to train and empower communities to provide comprehensive and sustainable support in the emergency planning and response processes. Acknowledging the particular vulnerabilities of childcare services during emergencies, the Tulsa initiative offers an example of collaboration between emergency management professionals and child-focused networks to develop and improve emergency plans for child care centers and homes that are coordinated with local emergency management plans. The New York model reflects a combination of large city emergency planning and the utilization of Save the Children’s safe spaces program which establishes a safe area in evacuation shelters for children.

Additionally, Save the Children offers resiliency programs to help communities cope after a disaster, while also partnering with local children’s organizations to train community members to provide a sustainable system of psychosocial support sessions designed to help children and caregivers recover emotionally and reestablish a sense of trust, security and self-esteem.

Together, these programs show that the comprehensive nature of child safety and community emergency planning requires the collaborative effort of dedicated partnerships to develop sustainable child focused emergency preparedness systems that will be ready and resilient in the face of a future disaster.

Women and National Reconstruction:
Eritrea After its 30 Years War of Independence

This paper examines a prolonged national reconstruction effort after Eritrea’s successful, but highly destructive 30 years war of independence against Ethiopian colonialism--ending in 1991. In particular, it scrutinizes the degree to which the Eritrean leadership pursued and solidified a project of women’s emancipation that had been initially articulated and implemented during the national liberation struggle. This assessment will draw upon not only discussions with government officials and a review of policy and program documents, but also on extensive interviewing with a diverse group of Eritrean women at the grassroots. Many of these women interviewees had first been engaged during the national liberation war as part of a longitudinal study that was conducted from 1983 to 2000. This paper analyzes the ideals, policies, and programs focused on gender equity generated by the first post-independence government in Eritrea. The study will concentrate on four realms--politics, the economy, the family, and formal and non-formal education. It will compare the articulation of policy makers with the lived experience of Eritrean women themselves. The paper also explores how nationalism and national cohesion that fuels a massive reconstruction effort both supports, and is in tension with women’s aspirations for gender equity. The paper delineates both the convergence and disparities between the goals and perspectives of predominantly male policymakers and the aspirations and experiences of women.

Wounded Communities in the World's Poorest Nation

In Niger, rated the world's poorest country by the UNDP Human Development Index in 2006, over 60% of the population lives on less than $1 a day. The country has been wracked with several major droughts, locust swarms, famines, and rebellions over the past 35 years. The hardest hit area has been the "ground zero of global warming," at the interface of the Sahara and the people who herd livestock for a living in the North of the country, in particular, the Tuaregs. Many Tuareg families have lost significant numbers of livestock due to droughts or retaliatory acts of soldiers who have killed camels and small livestock in the camps and villages within the conflict zone. Over the past two generations, most families have experienced refugee camps, hunger, malnutrition, and the death of one or more family members from starvation, epidemics, or the circumstances of warfare, including arbitrary arrests, public torture and extrajudicial execution of parents. In some cases, whole communities have had their homes and schools destroyed. In some cases, children have lost all of their immediate family members. At present these issues remain unresolved, and the government refuses to open a dialogue to discuss the issues surrounding the exclusion and marginalization of the Tuareg ethnic group. Water scarcity and food insecurity remain major stress-points for the nation as a whole; government corruption, South American drug trafficking, Muslim extremists, and the proliferation of weapons are also major concerns that affect local populations. What measures could be taken to help Tuareg families in Niger survive this period of uncertainty and take hope in rebuilding their livelihoods and communities? The author, an anthropologist, speaks from personal experience, having lived among the Tuaregs during crisis years, and from current research on the ongoing rebellion in Tuareg regions, and offers case studies based on solutions that have worked in the past, with recommendations for the current crisis.

Disasters As a Chance to Implement Novel Solutions that Highlight Attention to Human Dignity

The sustainability of social cohesion and ecological survival for humankind requires a focus on human dignity, implemented with a mindset of cooperation and humility, rather than disrespect and humiliation. Evelin G. Lindner, a social scientist with an interdisciplinary orientation, is the Founding Director and President of Human Dignity and Humiliation Studies (HumanDHS), a global transdisciplinary fellowship of academics and practitioners who wish to promote dignity and transcend humiliation. This network was founded in 2001 and has since grown to ca. 1,000 invited members from all over the world, with the website being read by ca. 40, 000 people from 183 countries per year.

HumanDHS researchers and practitioners attempt to create public awareness for the destructive effects of humiliation, and to promote alternative approaches that generate and embody human dignity and respect.

The central human rights message is expressed in Article 1 of the of the Human Rights Declaration, which states that every human being is born with equal dignity (and ought not be humiliated). This ideal requires concerted action to be implemented, not just in the field of legal regulations, but in every sphere of human life, including architecture and the way we create our built environments, and including disaster management.

After disasters, communities are prone to suffer violations of dignity in numerous ways. However, disasters can also open space for the implementation of novel solutions that highlight attention to human dignity. For example, victims of disasters can be encouraged to become co-creators of interventions, rather than merely recipients of help - research indicates that help can have humiliating effects. Since disasters disrupt established life, they even entail the potential to open more space for empowerment than was present prior to the event - this can occur, for example, when women are given more visibility than they had before.

Disasters unmask in stark ways the short-comings of human interventions in general, be it with regard to management philosophies (in case of disasters, for example, how aid is being delivered), or how housing is designed (in the case of disasters, for example, how emergency shelters are being built), or how short-term and long-term planning is interwoven (in the case of disasters, whether humanitarian emergency aid is being integrated with longer-term development goals).

Many short-comings are related to a lack of attention to human rights, not just their legal aspects, but the spirit of human rights, namely equality in dignity for all. Human interventions in society in general, as well as approaches to disaster intervention, often stem from times when sensitivity to the notion of equality in dignity was still weak. Sometimes this lack of sensitivity is overtly visible, at other times notions such as "expertise" or "efficiency" cover up for or "justify" violations of human rights. Obsessive rectangularity and military uniformity, for example, when shelters are built or aid is offered, are often being justified with arguments of "efficiency" and "practicability," or that recipients of help should be happy with what they get.

However, these are obsolete arguments. How is a helpless person, struggling to heal and build a new life, to be expected to improve if his or her basic individuality is removed and humiliated into helpless uniformity? The loss of diversity is not a small loss. Human beings are living creatures, meaning that they are diverse creatures who thrive on diverse environments. Individual human identity and health depend not least on diversity markers. Uniformity ignores this human need, relegating human beings to the humiliating status of machines.

International organizations, accustomed to responding to emergencies and developmental needs, need to develop concepts of efficiency and practicability that nurture inclusive and dignifying diversity. Today the term "mainstreaming" permeates many discourses: The spirit of human rights, the emphasis on human dignity, needs to be mainstreamed also in disaster management.

Sustaining Mitigation of Disasters in Communities:
Building Effective Local Capacity to Help People Cope with Conflict and Mitigate the Effects of Disasters

The disasters caused by wars and other violent conflicts are obiquitous around the globe, and, unfortunately, are too frequently accompanied and compounded by the co-occurrence of natural and/or other man-made disasters. Increasingly, the lines between natural vs. man-made disasters become diffused, as the effects of natural disasters lead to conflicts, and violent conflicts & hostilities affect the natural cycles. This often interrupts food production, damages water supplies, over-demands health services and creates severely limits transportation in affected communities and areas.

Well-meaning relief providers often do not understand how to engage people and take the time to help them address the needs in comflict-impacted communities. Relief supplies and initiatives to rebuild communities frequently run headlong into communities where strong hostilities exist, with poor, or even disastrous, results. Indeed, well-intentioned relief and assistance efforts can exacerbate the hostile interests and aggravate problems in communities.

To add to the problems, government planners responsible for disaster response & assistance often presume that sound programming involves government, rather than local communities, as the primary responders in crises. This presumption nearly always results in little on-the-ground preparation in communities, slow response to emergency conditions & needs and imposes "solutions" which are often inadequate or inappropriate for the victims.

In all of this -- communities in conflict as well as those beset by natural disasters -- those who suffer the most are the most vulnerable: children, families (especially families with single female head of household) and those who are disenfranchised and with no support systems (orphans, stranded single women and the elderly).

Just as we are hearing from presenters on closely-related topics, there are some effective and viable alternatives to this scenario – alternative approaches that contribute significantly to effectiveness and sustainability. Specially designed, planned, targeted and well-implementeted capacity-building assistance can be used to good effect in expanding awareness, understanding and highly relevant participatory policy-making among decision-makers at all levels. It can help develop effective ways to engage communities in taking responsibility and control, in taking appropriate action to mitigate conflict, prepare for "expectable unexpected" events & effects of disasters and prevent many of the negative impacts. In this regard, merely using "technical assistance" is generally neither sufficient nor effective.

The best "TA" involves a minimum of "outside" input, carefully adapted to local culture & conditions and validated by skilled local trainers. This "Localized TA" is used to engage, inform and equip local partner non-governmental organizations and government agencies, to implement and facilitate the same process at the community level. By embracing and utilizing this interactive process, NGOs and government can help communities develop participatory local initiatives that foster local empowerment and ownership of the problems and their solutions.

Rebuilding After Disaster: A Child-Centered Approach

Children often bear the brunt of the trauma and pain caused by a natural or man-made disaster. They are the most vulnerable, and their emotional scars can stay alive the longest. On the other hand, children are also the most resilient and first to recover, as though protected by their innate creativity and a natural coping mechanism.

Through the International Child Art Foundation’s experience in conducting post-disaster Healing Arts Programs and post-conflict Peace through Art Programs, a child-centered approach to disaster recovery has been developed. This methodology also draws from the understanding and knowledge gained from organizing a global Arts Olympiad for children ages 8 to 12 and from hosting the World Children’s Festival on the National Mall in Washington, DC every four years.

Healing Arts

In response to the December 24, 2004 tsunami in Asia, the ICAF developed a healing arts program to transfer the knowledge and experience gained from the treatment of the child survivors of the 9/11 tragedy and other recent disasters to help the tsunami child survivors. Scientific studies on the psychological effect of the 9/11 attack on the World Trade Center found that directly affected children were at risk for a variety of mental health problems including anxiety disorders, posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), and childhood traumatic grief (CTG), a condition affecting those who experience a death under traumatic circumstances. Preventing and treating the distress experienced by children as soon as possible is crucial for optimal long-term health and recovery. Parents, caregivers and teachers of these children were found to minimize, ignore, deny, criticize, or be sensitive and kind to the plight of the children, depending upon their own recovery and progress.

Although the circumstances and implications of every natural disaster are different, the knowledge gained from one tragedy is useful in diagnosis and treatment of the survivors of another. The Healing Arts Program has proven to be an effective tool in community building and reconstruction. In 2005 and 2006, the program was organized in Sri Lanka, India, and Indonesia, and in 2006 the program was extended to the U.S. Gulf Coast.

Child-centered Approach

Children who survive disasters must be allowed to be the central actors in rebuilding their communities. A focus on the children:

1. Forces the community to focus on its future needs rather than merely restoring the past that is lost;
2. Aids and accelerates the children’s emotional recovery, which in turn channels and guides the community’s mental recovery;
3. Leads to a focus on family as the most important social unit and the school as the community center for post-recovery;
4. Deepens the children’s emotional bonds with the place where they grew up, thus offsetting the unbearable memories of the disaster which may cause them to leave and restart their lives somewhere else; and
5. Revitalizes the community around the strength, hope, and optimism of its children.

A Sociological Perspective on Disasters

Sociologists study disasters in order to identify the significance of social factors for what we think of as natural phenomena and to determine how social factors shape the origins, course and outcomes of natural disaster. Sociological research ranging from Kai Erikson’s study of the 1973 Buffalo Creek mining disaster to Eric Klinenberg’s study of the 1993 Chicago heat wave, as well as recent research on Hurricane Katrina suggest five lessons.

1. Natural disasters play a critical but often overlooked role in society. From including volcanic eruptions in Indonesia in explanations of the fall of the Roman Empire to taking account of the Mississippi Flood of 1927 when accounting for the rebirth of the Democratic Party, social scientists must recognize the impact of natural disasters on social process.
   
   
2. Social forces shape the causes, course, and consequences of every disaster. In the words of Havidan Rodriguez (2006), “Disasters and vulnerability … are a reflection of how societies are organized.”
   
3. Social explanations of disaster compete with naturalistic explanations in a hotly contested terrain. Battles ensue after every natural disaster over the relative responsibility of political authorities and natural forces.
   
   
4. Culture shapes the societal interpretation of and response to disaster. Good technical management is essential for effective preparation and response, but since the Progressive Era’s infatuation with engineering, purely technical solutions fail to solve the social problems caused by disasters.
   
5. Formal social organization is always interlaced with and can neither function nor be understood without taking into account informal social ties. The importance of social ties for community recovery is one of the most consistent findings of sociologically informed disaster research.

How Technology Is Transforming Disaster Relief

Humanitarian relief and “hi-tech” never used to be mentioned in the same sentence. But that is changing, and quickly. The Aidmatrix Foundation, Inc., is leading the latest wave of entrepreneurial focus that is investing heavily in how we can use technology available in the for-profit world and make it applicable and accessible to the nonprofit world. Aidmatrix sat down with leaders within FEMA, state governments, corporate donors, and other leading relief organizations and asked the tough questions: “Why shouldn’t we build a vision of getting relief to disaster victims as efficiently as manufacturers, distributors, and big-box retailers get products to market?” and “Why not make it so easy for the for-profit world that it becomes ‘better business sense’ to donate surplus inventory rather than pay for disposal costs?” Previously, technology was the barrier. For-profits had it; nonprofits didn’t. That meant that nonprofits couldn’t really communicate in the language of the for-profit world.

Today, technology is becoming the common denominator between the two worlds. A new multinational donations management system and community, known as the Aidmatrix Network®, is making the vision a reality. The Aidmatrix Network is creating a revolutionary online exchange of humanitarian goods and services. This online donations management system was launched in June 2007 with the support of FEMA, Accenture, and UPS. Today, nearly half of the U.S. population is covered by the state governments participating in this system. Donors make in-kind donations online, often through an interface that integrates into their own ERP (enterprise resource planning) systems. Nonprofits post their specific needs online. Transportation companies arrange to donate transportation of the needed goods. Government agencies communicate with all of these groups in a more streamlined process. It’s all done online and it’s automating the world of humanitarian relief.

The Aidmatrix Network is already making a difference. The recent California wildfires of 2007 will go down in history as humanitarian aid “done right.” From the California Governor’s Office of Emergency Services (OES) to the corporate donors to the nonprofits and volunteers: each ring of the humanitarian relief chain cooperated in executing the state’s well-planned disaster program. Behind-the-scenes, the Aidmatrix Network was the common technology that linked these groups together.

The Lebanese in Post-Conflict Liberia

Since former Liberian President Charles Taylor left office in August 2003, effectively ending his country’s war, the Lebanese have played both a constructive and destructive role in the rebuilding of Liberia.

In this paper I first will present a framework for understanding Liberian government policies toward the powerful Lebanese community in the country since 1980. I will argue that theories posed by political scientists that emphasize the importance of informal institutional quality in explaining ethnic violence can be useful in helping to understand why government policies that have impacted the Lebanese in Liberia have been relatively moderate and restrained, especially when compared to government policies that have impacted ethnic minority trading groups in other African countries. Also, by utilizing in-group policing mechanisms to reduce opportunism among members of the Lebanese community and at the same time promoting charitable giving toward Liberians, the Lebanese appear to have thwarted elevated ethnic conflict. This section will draw on research I did in Liberia in 2005 and 2006 for my undergraduate political science thesis at Emory University.

Second I will describe and explain the relationship between current President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf’s administration and the Lebanese community. I will make the case that the government is managing a constructive relationship with the Lebanese, while at the same time gradually developing and implementing policies to promote Liberian entrepreneurship, some of which might hurt Lebanese businesses.

Third I will discuss the role the Lebanese have played in rebuilding Liberia since the war ended. I will describe the complicated impact of their businesses and investments, and argue that they are both promoting reconstruction and further investment, while simultaneously hurting Liberian businesses and decelerating development.

Rebuilding Green: A Small Town Plans its Future

Greensburg, Kansas, was destroyed by a Class-5 tornado on the night of May 4, 2007. The devastation resulted in the loss of 95 percent of the town’s home and businesses. In the media flurry that followed the tornado, one of the questions was: Would Greensburg rebuild? Before the tornado, Greensburg was a struggling oil, gas and farming community that, like most small, rural towns, was seeing its population dwindle. Although some of the older resident moved to neighboring towns and cities, the residents who stayed were committed to building a better Greensburg.

Although the popular sentiment was that Greensburg would rebuild, the question of rebuilding became one of “how” to rebuild. After residents had spent many months meeting in outdoor tents set up by FEMA to shield themselves from the Kansan sun, the townspeople decided, along with strong community leadership, that the town should rebuild green. After consulting with green building experts and architectural and design firms, the commitment was made and instantiated with a city referendum that Greensburg would rebuild green. Greensburg will have the highest number of LEED-Platinum buildings, per capita, anywhere in the world.

This project considers the redevelopment of Greensburg, Kansas. Disaster literature, especially an emerging theme known as sustainable disaster recovery, is used to situate this study to understand the intersection of community and sustainability, that is to say, the social component of sustainability. By using participant observation along with both formal and informal interviews, this project explores the ways in which community and sustainability are co-constitutive. Narratives of sustainable rebuilding are varied; however, rebuilding green is not possible without involvement from the affected community.

Stephanie Hartwell

Multiple Perspectives in the Wake of Disasters
Honors Students Panel Presentation

During this panel presentation we will focus on the consequences of disasters including unhealthy environmental exposures and issues related to human dignity from a variety of perspectives. Our panel consists of undergraduate honors students in the Environmental Justice and Human Disasters course at UMass Boston. Students in the course have a variety of academic majors and backgrounds. Their range of expertise includes social sciences, biology and environmental studies, economics, political science, and culture (arts, theatre and literature). Using case studies such as Hurricane Ike, the recent earthquake in China, the perennial Forest Fires in California, the perpetual drought in Sudan, and/or the Tsunami in Southeast Asia, the student panel will bring multiple perspectives to the analysis of the aftermath of disasters. Social, political, economic, environmental, cultural and public health trends and patterns will be highlighted.

View all Panelists (3.9 MB PDF)

Meeting the Needs of Infants and Toddlers Today and Tomorrow
Respect: The Key to Raising a Self Confident Young Child in Nepal

Change can happen through hard work and perseverance. Those who see can really see not only an authentic child but also an authentic adult emerge into a "dance of respect" together.

Although very difficult, seeing with new eyes gives each of us the power to change directions from within, to observe, to see without prejudice, to like each other, and ourselves and be at peace. If we really focus on what the young child can do, we can celebrate each child's moment-to-moment competencies and challenges. We learned and are continuing to learn to look for cues from the child and listen to our inner voice. After seeing and living the differences of being cared for in conventional Nepalese care compared to creating a more respectful child-friendly environment for our children, we have allowed young children to be the initiator, and the advocate for their self-discovery and self-regulation with exploration using critical thinking skills.

This is based on the work of the late Magda Gerber, founder of Resources for Infant Educarers (RIE).

Teaching Social Justice in International Service-Learning Classes

International service-learning opportunities offer a vehicle for teaching social justice to undergraduate and graduate students in social work. Based on the literature and our experiences teaching service-learning classes that involve travel to developing countries and to oppressed communities in more developed countries, this paper describes important elements in teaching social justice in such venues.

The preparation of successful international service-learning classes begins well before the design of a course syllabus (Jacoby & Associates, 1996). Selecting service partners is critical, so that the service component is meaningful, provides an in-depth learning experience, and reflects the best practices in the target country (which may be quite different from the practices “at home”). The transnational partnerships underlying service-learning opportunities must be carefully developed and nurtured. A key goal is to foster international understanding and collaboration. Accordingly, the partnerships must be democratic, mutually beneficial, mutually respectful, and sustainable (Jacoby & Associates, 2003). Examples of agreements with service partners will be provided as well as specific descriptions of how relationships with NGOs and other groups in other countries have been developed, improved, and maintained over time despite distances and relatively infrequent face-to-face contact.

Intellectual preparation of the students is necessary so that they have a context for examining social justice issues (Cress, Collier, & Reitenauer, 2005; Eyler, Giles, & Giles, 1999). In addition to study of the history, culture, economics, and social issues of the country to be visited, students must examine the impact of U.S. and transnational policies, particularly on vulnerable populations. For example, the North America Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) has a huge impact on indigenous communities in Chiapas, Mexico. Students will find that internally displaced people living in refugee camps in Chiapas are well-informed about NAFTA as it relates to their coffee industry and other natural resources, or the implications of the growth of Coca-Cola’s business in their communities. Without a solid foundational understanding of the issues, students will be unable to take full advantage of their hosts’ knowledge and experiences—experiences that are fundamental to developing a global understanding of social justice.

Simply attending lectures and visiting social agencies in the target country are not sufficient for providing a transformative educational experience. The in-country visit must create multiple and varied opportunities for students to enter the lives of people in the country they are visiting, without exploiting their hosts. These opportunities might include a cultural immersion experience, interacting around a communal event, building a home or school together, or participating in an agency’s public relations event. Without these, students’ learning is confined to an intellectual level.

Service-learning opportunities in social work, particularly at the graduate level, should involve in-depth service experiences. Developing and delivering in-service training for a service partner or shadowing workers can help students view human services from the perspective of local providers. Conducting a needs assessment in an oppressed and overlooked community, such as a Roma camp, can provide valuable information for the students and local agencies. This presentation will illustrate a range of such opportunities via written descriptions of projects, reports of needs assessments, and photographs and video clips of service activities.

Providing opportunities for students to continually reflect on their experiences during and after the trip is critical to the development of social justice concepts. Methods of building these reflections into the class will be described. Group reflection is one way to ensure that students do not “romanticize” poverty or view what they are observing and experiencing through the bias of a “U.S. lens.” Self-assessment tools help students gauge their learning. Assessing the service-learning class also is necessary to determine if learning and transnational collaborative goals have been met and to make improvements for the future (Welch & Billig, 2004). The experience must end with a “call to action” when students return home (Bringle, Phillips, & Hudson, 2004; Weigert, Crews, & Zlotkowski, 1999). To honor the contribution of the service partners, faculty members must find ways to maintain the connection between the School of Social Work and their partners in other countries.

Finally, many seemingly mundane, but critical logistical issues must be addressed in both a proactive and reactive way to insure the success of service-learning classes. To deal with the inevitable “hassles” involved with travel, it is essential to develop relationships among class members prior to leaving the home country. Safety measures and pre-planning will reduce risk. The presentation discusses some of these challenges as well as fundraising, competition for slots, and managing group dynamics.

War and Misunderstanding:
Errors of Judgment in Colombian Job-Training Policies

Colombian society has been at war for more than five decades, with all the undesirable consequences of armed conflict. The entire population has suffered in this process of violence. The children and teenagers who have been detached from the irregular armed organizations have been especially affected. These underage populations are basically those children, teenagers and young adults captured in combat by the Colombian Military Forces or who have escaped from any irregular armed organization (guerrillas or paramilitary) and who also agreed to join in a project for social and productive insertion into society. This project was funded by governmental resources.

A good deal of analysis is dedicated to the relationship between prevailing social and educational policy models and the consequences of the kind of aid – basically assistance-oriented help – offered to children and teenagers detached from irregular armed organizations. Work done with the identified population in Bogota, Manizales and Villavicencio examines the institutional and social constraints members of this population encounter when they have endured a process of this sort. However, the conclusions extracted go beyond the particular insights of this experience to larger reasoning about Colombia’s labor market. Using a social and productive insertion process designed by the Research Center for Development at the National University of Colombia between 2006 and 2007 for the Colombian Institute of Family Welfare (ICBF) we try to understand not only the particular reality and challenges that the identified population faces, but also how best to shape the role of public policy in twenty-first century Colombia. Data gathered in this social and productive insertion process, combined with the Colombian government’s current understanding of the labor world, directs the entire Colombian educational system into a model for job training based essentially on the competencies approach.

Yet this analysis is erroneous. The core hypothesis of this investigation is that a misunderstanding of the competencies approach and the resulting flawed programs in the Colombian educational system prepare the Colombian labor force at the most for the general needs of the market, not for the needs of individual job-seekers. The conclusion of this paper will demonstrate that in carrying out a flawed design and in extending the reaches of that design beyond its original scope, the Colombian government is making a significant error with regard to the identified social group and is formulating ineffective policy with regard to Colombian labor in general.

After Disaster Strikes: Rebuilding Local Energy Networks

Protecting and rebuilding critical energy infrastructure has entered the public’s awareness after such high profile disasters as the September 11th, attacks, and Hurricanes Katrina and Ike. A new understanding has arisen of the necessity to conduct advance preparation for energy emergencies, and to build durable capacity to quickly react to disasters and provide affected communities with the energy they need. Electric grids tend to be quite vulnerable because of its heavy dependence on interlinkages, and much of its important infrastructure is exposed above ground, unlike below ground liquid or gas pipelines, However, research has shown that if a viable plan is implemented in the immediate aftermath of a disaster, a decentralized energy hub can be set up promptly, thus supplying residents with energy access during the critical stages after a disaster when energy is most needed.

This presentation will explain the formulation of an “energy plan” in order to assist afflicted communities in resolving their energy needs. Further, case studies will be used detailing what went right and wrong in the aftermath of various disasters in terms of providing energy access. The study will finally look at the feasibility of constructing a distributed energy asset network, which may be able to provide energy stabilization in times of disaster.

Building community resilience: Mitigating the effects of displacement

Resilience is a multi-dimensional construct defined as the capacity of individuals, families, communities, systems and institutions to anticipate, withstand and/or judiciously engage with catastrophic events and/or experiences, actively making meaning out of adversity, with the goal of maintaining ‘normal’ function without fundamentally losing their identity (Almedom, 2008). This definition crystallized in the context of several interdisciplinary and cross-sector discussions and deliberations in international meetings focusing on the concept of resilience, the science and art of measuring or assessing resilience, and/or the practice of promoting, building and maintaining resilience.

With respect to mass disasters or complex emergencies, it is important to examine three key questions:

• Is it meaningful (for individuals, families, communities and/or institutions to engage with adversity?
• Is it feasible to restore normal function in the immediate and/or long-term aftermath of disasters?
• Is it possible for individuals, families, communities, or institutions to undergo turbulent change brought about by disasters and still retain their identity?

Clearly, the instinct to survive calamity may drive critical adaptive responses to turbulence at all levels. The question is what is the role of agency and where is the line drawn between transformation and retention of original identity? This panel will explore these issues from the perspectives of mass displacement wrought by complex emergencies in Africa, Europe, and North America.

• Social support and Sense of Coherence/Resilience in Eritrea (Almedom)
• NYC Recovers, Gulf Coast Recovers (Fullilove & Fullilove)
• ACORN Building resilience, mitigating displacement after Katrina (Rathke)
• Building resilience by promoting disaster preparedness at all levels (Williams)

"Using Songs as Educational Tools for Teaching Disasters to Preschoolers"

Various programs and activities have been designed and used in different parts of the world for educating children about disasters with similar objectives: firstly to motivate children and their families to take action in order to be better prepared to survive a disaster with minimal injury, loss of property, and psychological problems, and secondly to teach them about the science of an specific hazard and related issues. Audio and visual tapes can be beneficially used in preschool levels, in addition to which children can benefit from the messages conveyed by music, songs and films.

In Iran, audio-tapes are used to disseminate safety messages to families including recommended preparatory measures such as sheltering during earthquakes, and recovery activities after an earthquake. An audio-tape is produced by the International Institute of Earthquake Engineering and Seismology (IIEES) and is in use in Iran in kindergartens. The tape presents safety recommendations to be applied during an earthquake in the form of a song, “Earthquake and Safety”, accompanied by a lively music. Children are very receptive to the song which is simple and easily understood. The tape also incorporates a simply worded conversational explanation of some scientific principles relating to earth-quakes in a manner which is appealing to children and welcoming to the parents. In this paper, it is tried to introduce songs as a tool in teaching disasters and to highlight their effectiveness in children’s learning about hazards such as earthquakes. Among the issues which will be discussed in this paper are the content of the “Earthquake and Safety” song, how to simplify the scientific terms and statements to be included in the song, the rhythm to be used, the consideration of cultural and pedagogical issues, and how to produce the song in a way which can communicate with the children and teachers more effectively.

When the Cameras Leave: Journeys of Recovery

Following every major disaster, the media coverage and convergence of resources is often overwhelming. However, following the response, many resources are exhausted and the most vulnerable are left behind. More often that not, for them the recovery is just beginning.

This represents an overarching challenge in recovery from disasters. Given women and children both domestically and internationally (particularly the underserved and vulnerable) are vastly underrepresented in policy and planning or in the response and recovery, it is predictable that the outcome is women and vulnerable populations are disproportionately affected. 

In her presentation, Angela shares stories and her case for change regarding recovery from disasters. Through a combination of her personal experience and a collection of case studies, she describes how gender, violence and vulnerable populations are issues that are buried -- only to become magnified when disasters hit. 

Given survivors are often left without resources and tools to rebuild their lives, Angela will discuss the need to support innovative, evidence-based programs and to provide resources and tools to those who need them, therefore reducing community vulnerability to violence and disaster.