Wildfire and Power

Policy and Practice

Peter Fairbrother, Meagan Tyler

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2018
• ISBN:
  9780429766107
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Government & Business
• Index: Business

This book brings together perspectives from sociology, political science, gender studies, and history to produce new ways of analysing wildfire preparedness and policy in Australia. Drawing on data from hundreds of interviews with residents, volunteers and emergency services professionals living and working in wildfire-prone areas, the authors focus on issues of power and inequality, the contested nature of community and the relationship between citizens and the state.

The book questions not only existing policy approaches, but also the central concepts on which they are founded. In doing so, the aim is to create a more conceptually robust and academically contextualised discussion about the limitations of current wildfire policy approaches in Australia and to provide further evidence of the need for disaster studies to engage with a variety of social science approaches.

Wildfire and Power: Policy and Practice will be of most interest to higher degree by research students, other academics and policy makers examining the evolving patterns and politics of work, employment, management and industrial relations as well as those involved in emergency and disaster management service delivery. It would be most suited to academic and public libraries as well as organisations in the field of emergency and disaster management.

1 Wildfire

A Social and Political Perspective

Peter Fairbrother and Meagan Tyler

Disasters are social events. A natural hazard becomes a disaster when it interferes with the lives and well-being of people and communities. How to prepare for, experience and recover from such events is a long-standing challenge and puzzle. Often, the most expedient solution is viewed as a combination of state support and regulation, and the use of technologically based practices to monitor, prepare and deal with the immediate and then ensue recovery. A corollary of this focus is that individuals and their communities require the capabilities to prepare for and address the possibility of disaster events as well as their actual occurrence and aftermath. In this seemingly rounded way, it is claimed that natural disaster can be dealt with in more or less effective and expedient ways (e.g. McLennan and Handmer, 2012). The problem is that these relations bring questions of power into play in stark ways, a feature that is usually overlooked in relation to disaster events. Disaster events therefore require sociological and political analysis.

Increasing attention has been given to the ways in which communities adapt to such events and recover (e.g. Norris et al., 2008; see also McLennan, 2016). In this respect, it is necessary to understand what enables engagement in relation to the prospect and actuality of disaster events as well as the inhibitors of such preparations and arrangements. Specifically, community actors, those living in disaster-prone localities, may not have the capabilities and resources to address these concerns, at least in ways that mitigate and allow adaptations to these types of events. Of course, those in such localities deal with often contested narratives about the dangers and responses that are most appropriate. Further, their resources to deal with such events may be limited. What appears to be a sensible, rational way of addressing such events for one individual, one household or even one locality may not be the same for another.

To understand the exercise of capacities, we argue that it is necessary to reflect on the social relationships that make up the societies in which we live. This focus draws attention to the complex relations between the state, the economy and civil society. These relations can be marked by inclusiveness and closure; they may be structured so some can exercise agency, while others are more constrained, and hence it is important to understand the ways in which societies are organised and structured. In general, in liberal democratic states, questions relating to the exercise of power and the bases of equality are to the fore. Increasingly, these states are structured in terms of inequalities – wealth, social position, gender, race, perceived capacities – and the exercise of power by dominant interests. So, who has capability and who has resources matter. Thus, to understand disaster, and in this case wildfire events (bushfire, grass fire, forest fire),¹ we argue that it is necessary to consider power and inequality, and the ways individuals and collectivities may be enabled or marginalised in relation to their vulnerability to such events. Policymakers often lack comprehensive understandings of the ‘vulnerable’ (frequently limiting the notion to the elderly and infirm) and do not appreciate the social bases of vulnerability, access to resources or unhelpful administrative and bureaucratic procedures (Wisner and Luce, 1993). More specifically, it is critical to trace out the power relations that define how and under what circumstances different social groupings can exercise agency in relation to disaster events. Such a focus draws attention to those who wield power in society (those who own and control resources), and those who ‘control information and …define agendas’ (Wisner and Luce, 1993: 129).

Understanding disasters, therefore, is not just about observing, tracking and documenting ‘uncontrolled brute forces’ but rather about analysing the ‘interaction of hazards and natural events with social structures’ (Enarson and Morrow, 1998, p. 1). Over time, disaster studies have shifted to recognise this aspect: from quantitative, military-influenced studies in the 1950s and 1960s to the inclusion of qualitative social sciences and humanities in more recent decades (Reynolds, 2017). This shift has led to a greater acknowledgement of the role of social disasters and the need to better understand how people, in varied contexts, prepare for, react to and recover from disaster events.

We argue, however, that disasters must be situated not only in social contexts but in political contexts as well. As Enarson and Morrow (1998: 2) note, ‘[d]isasters reveal community, regional and global power structures, as well as power relations within intimate relationships’. That is, disaster events bring power relations to the fore across all levels, from the international and national to the organisational and local to the household and familial. This is one reason why disaster studies can and should focus on inequalities of power. We use this prism to analyse the context of wildfire/bushfire in Australia, where these themes are still significantly under-represented in existing research.

The Problem

Wildfire is one of the most common diaster events in many countires, including Spain, Portugal, the United States, Canada, Russia and Australia. Wildfires are an ongoing threat to society and increasingly so with climate change. The evidence is persuasive that societies across the world can expect an increasing range of disaster events throughout the twenty-first century, and wildfires are part of an increasing frequency and intensity of disasters, including floods, cyclones, hurricanes and other extreme events. It has become especially pressing to consider how and under what circumstances the residents and others in disaster-prone localities can deal with these events in ways that minimise the consequences.

The question becomes how best to address these disaster events for individuals, for families, for communities, for disaster agencies and for states. The impact of disasters will become part of the lives of many, and people across the world, and their governments and related agencies, will seek to prepare, quell, mitigate or adapt to these events. The question is how can these events be addressed in ways that minimise the loss of life and damage to property, infrastructure and livelihoods that are crucial for humane and sustainable societies? Thus, to put the question in the context of wildfire in Australia, it is necessary to review the relationship between the likelihood of the increased incidence and intensity of natural disasters; the preparations and responses taken by agencies and organisations; and the experience and understandings that individuals and groups bring to bear to prepare for, respond to and recover from such events.

Climate Change

There may be debate about the precise sequence and patterns of climate change, but there is no scientific doubt that Earth’s surface is warming, with compelling consequences for the incidence and intensity of disaster events (IPPC Synthesis Report, 2014). Of course, in modern society, where some claim that all opinions have value, public irrationalists (euphemistically termed climate sceptics) can have a disproportionate impact on public debate and, in many cases, policy formulation and implementation. Such irrationality has the consequence of clouding understandings about the actual and probable impacts of climate change. But disasters do have a way of clarifying understandings about danger, preparation and response. Hence, for us the first step in the analysis is to understand the context in which there is an increased incidence and intensity in disaster events.

The evidence is clear; climate changes are taking place, and they are principally a consequence of human intervention.

Human influence on the climate system is clear, and recent anthropogenic emissions of greenhouse gases are the highest in history. Recent climate changes have had widespread impacts on human and natural systems.

(IPCC Synthesis Report, 2014: 36)

The impact is that the Earth’s surface is warming. As stated, rather starkly:

Warming of the climate system is unequivocal, and since the 1950s, many of the observed changes are unprecedented over decades to millennia.

(IPPC Synthesis Report, 2014: 36)

But, of concern and reflected in the incidence and intensity of disaster events, in each of the last three decades, the Earth’s surface has been successively warmer ‘than any preceding decade since 1850’ (IPPC Synthesis Report, 2014: 38).

Scientists express caution in relation to causation:

Anthropogenic forcing have likely [sic] made a substantial contribution to surface temperature increases since the mid-20th century over every continental region except Antarctica.

(IPPC Synthesis Report, 2014: 5)

Nonetheless, these changes play out in rather precise ways. As stated:

In urban areas, climate change is projected to increase risks for people, assets, economies and ecosystems, including risks from heat stress, storms and extreme precipitation, inland and coastal pollution, drought, water scarcity, sea-level rise, and storm surges (very high confidence). These risks are amplified for those lacking essential infrastructure and services or living in exposed areas.

(IPPC Synthesis Report, 2014: 15–16)

And:

Rural areas are expected to experience major impacts on water availability and supply, food security, infrastructure, and agricultural incomes, including shifts in the production areas of food and non-food crops around the world (high confidence).

(IPCC Synthesis Report, 2014: 16)

There has been an observed increase in the incidence and intensity of disaster events, including droughts, wind-storms, fires and pest outbreaks. While not conclusive, it is reasonable to attribute these trajectories in part to climate change, with ‘medium confidence’ (IPCC Synthesis Report, 2014: 53). Thus, climate changes are increasing the likelihood of extreme weather events, such as flooding and drought (van Aalst, 2006).

Of importance these impacts are climate-related events, and hence it is necessary to take climate changes into account in relation to disaster events.

Impacts from recent climate-related extremes, such as heat waves, droughts, floods, cyclones, and wildfires, reveal significant vulnerability and exposure of some ecosystems and many human systems to current climate variability (very high confidence). Impacts of such climate-related extremes include alteration of ecosystems, disruption of food production and water supply, damage to infrastructure and settlements, human morbidity and mortality, and consequences for mental health and human well-being. For countries at all levels of development, these impacts are consistent with a significant lack of preparedness for current climate variability in some sectors.

(IPCC Synthesis Report, 2014: 55–56)

Thus, it is reasonable to suppose that disaster events are something that will continue to impact society, and there is a reasonable expectation that they will intensify in incidence and impact.

In relation to policy and preparation a variety of levels of action are necessary. Steps should be taken, and in limited ways are being taken, to address the causes and impacts of climate changes. It is vital that such initiatives are understood as intimately related to research and work to address and mitigate disaster events.

Disaster Events: Wildfire/Bushfire

Wildfires affect approximately 350 million hectares of land a year (FAO, 2010) in the northern and southern hemispheres. Australia, in particular the south-eastern part of the continent, is one of the most wildfire-prone localities in the world. Wildfires account for a significant incidence of injury and death, in the latter case comparable to flood and tropical cyclone (Coates et al., 2014). Other assessments claim that bushfires and grass fires account for nearly half the total death and injury cost from natural hazards (AIC, 2004). Wildfires impact the social, ecological and economic domains. Such fire events affect populations across urban, peri-urban and rural settings.

In Australia it is predicted that there will be an increasing number of high or extreme risk fire days (Hennessy et al., 2006; Climate Council, 2013). Recent wildfires in Australia have caused losses of life, property and livestock as well as environmental damage to large areas of land. For example, in 2013 wildfires in New South Wales burnt over 1.4 million hectares (RFS, 2013). Just over 200 homes were destroyed in Dunalley, Tasmania, in January 2013. Most significantly, the February 2009 bushfires in the State of Victoria killed 173 people and destroyed 2,059 homes (AEMI, n.d.). These have become known as the ‘Black Saturday’ fires. The subsequent Victorian Bushfires Royal Commission (Teague et al., 2010) drew attention, in part, to how state agencies communicate information and warnings about wildfires to the public.

Background

Wildfire, an increasing threat in Australia, raises specific questions for populations living in localities as well as for governments and agencies tasked with the question of how to ensure the ongoing safety of the communities that constitute these localities. Effective communication is central to the processes of wildfire preparedness and response. Two approaches are possible, one focussing on the modes, forms and content of communication in the event of fire and the other examining the ways in which communication takes place within complex social relationships, involving citizens, residents, workers, protective and service agencies, and governments.

The research that informs this book addressed the latter theme. This research was undertaken by researchers from the then Centre of Sustainable Organisations and Work (now the Centre for People, Organisation and Work) at RMIT University in Melbourne, Australia, for the Bushfire Cooperative Research Centre. The report focussed on the forms, media and processes of communication in relation to bushfire. It identified strengths, shortcomings and complexities in communication and examined the salience of formal and informal relationships, and their dynamics within communities and community networks. Of note, and relevant for this book, the report addressed education and capacity-building strategies. They were assessed in relation to the mode of provision as well as in relation to forms of dissemination. The question was whether people in bushfire-prone localities hear, understand and act.

In the Australian context, the issue of wildfire safety communication can be especially fraught, given that the history and official policy position for fire agencies is not one of mandatory evacuation when a bushfire threatens. The Prepare, Stay and Defend or Leave Early (PSDLE) policy, known colloquially as ‘Stay or Go’, has significantly shaped bushfire safety practice in Australia and has a long informal history. It is a policy unique to Australia and encourages residents to determine a bushfire safety strategy that involves either ‘staying to defend’ a property while a fire front passes (often involving extinguishing embers) or self-evacuation well before a fire threatens. This policy stands in contrast to most other bushfire-prone localities around the world, where state-facilitated evacuation is standard (Reynolds, 2017). Although the policy has come under increasing scrutiny in recent years, it is still widely supported and was in place, largely unquestioned by wildfire agencies and staff, at the time our research was conducted.

As wildfire agencies are State-based (rather than national) in Australia, the project comprised focussed case study research within selected communities in four States: New South Wales, Tasmania, Victoria and Western Australia. Many of the participants had actually experienced bushfire or had heard stories from family members. These localities were selected because they are designated as highly vulnerable to bushfire by the respective state fire agencies. Utilising ethnographic-type research techniques, the research focussed on the intersection between authorities, agencies and community groups. Between 2010 and 2013 the research team carried out more than 200 interviews (mostly in person, with some by telephone) with residents and wildfire agency staff across 12 different localities – a mix of rural, urban-rural interface and what are colloquially known as ‘sea-change’ or ‘tree-change’ localities – which have experienced a recent influx of former city or urban residents and tourists. Two related work packages took up particular themes, each building on the case study research and utilising methodologies developed in previous research. First, an action research program was initiated to identify ways of building and strengthening social networks that facilitate effective communications. Second, a focussed enquiry was undertaken into the role and place of education and awareness strategies as forms of communication in the process of capacity building and awareness development (see Fairbrother et al. 2014).

Thus the project examined and provided an understanding of the social, political and historical bases of community awareness and resilience in bushfire contexts. It focussed on the intersection between community, institutions and organisations in relation to communication. As a broad concept, communication is the process of establishing meaning, encompassing all forms of social interaction from the personal to public announcements. Communication takes on significance at multiple levels within the community, from organisational and operational communications, such as bushfire warnings, to community education programs and the communication of messages and information via public campaigns.

It is also important to note that the original data collection, on which the analysis in this book is based, occurred in the years immediately following ‘Black Saturday’ (2010–2013). The Black Saturday fires are understood to be one of the worst peacetime disasters of postcolonial Australia. Black Saturday occurred in February (late summer) 2009 and involved a series of fires in the State of Victoria, one of the most wildfire-prone locations on earth. As noted earlier, the fires claimed the lives of 173 people, destroyed 2,059 houses and burned more than 450,000 hectares of land (MacDougall et al., 2014). The fires damaged not only the surrounding infrastructure but also the social fabric of the communities that were affected (Teague et al., 2010). The subsequent Royal Commission into the fires, and the official response to them, brought to the fore significant questions as to the effectiveness of wildfire communication and community preparedness in Australia.² Our data collection, therefore, provides an illuminating snapshot of a time when wildfire agencies and residents in wildfire-prone localities were often questioning the established approaches to wildfire safety, community organising and effective communication. In the years during which we conducted this research, we saw significant flux in terms of how agencies were structured, how they related to each other and how they framed their communications. We also saw resistance to new ways of doing things and a reluctance to admit that many of the traditional approaches to wildfire safety in Australia were flawed.

The project therefore offered a unique opportunity to consider approaches to wildfire in the wake of one of the worst wildfire disasters on record, and we developed an innovative approach in applying a robust sociopolitical framework to understand communication strategies and their effectiveness. The use of this perspective provided a significant chance to critique and update existing understandings as well as provide a way of assessing and evaluating preparation and communication strategies. It employed the concept of relational networks to understand the links between social institutions, such as the fire authorities and citizens. Hence t...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• List of Authors
• Acknowledgements
• 1 Wildfire: A Social and Political Perspective
• 2 Concepts of Community
• 3 Cohesion and Complexity: The State, Community and Communities
• 4 The State and Communities
• 5 Communities: Relationships and Responsibilities
• 6 Engaging Communities: What Happens Behind the Scenes
• 7 Wildfire Safety, Communication and Diversity
• 8 Power within Households: Gender Inequality and Wildfire Preparedness
• 9 Challenges for Wildfire Policy and Practice
• Bibliography
• Index