Dealing with Disaster

Public Management in Crisis Situations

Saundra K. Schneider

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2014
• ISBN:
  9781317473350
• Edition: 2
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Human Resource Management
• Index: Business

Now updated with examples through 2010, this classic study examines the disruptive effects of disasters on patterns of human behavior and the operations of government, and the conditions under which even relatively minor crises can lead to system breakdown.

Part One

Analytical and Theoretical Frameworks

1
The Varied Success of the Governmental Response to Natural Disasters

Over the last two decades, a sizable number of major natural disasters have struck the United States. For example, on September 17, 1989, a massive hurricane named Hugo blasted the U.S. Virgin Islands at full force. Then, on the following day, the storm ripped its way across the northeast portion of Puerto Rico. After a brief respite in the Atlantic Ocean, Hugo hit the U.S. mainland about forty miles northeast of Charleston, South Carolina. The huge storm pounded the coastal areas for several hours; then it moved quickly and violently in a northwesterly direction, carving a destructive path across half the state of South Carolina. Hugo made one last stop at Charlotte, North Carolina, before it finally turned north and diminished in strength. During its brief but violent life, Hugo left thousands of people without shelter, water, food, sewer facilities, electricity, or telephone services. Overall, it was responsible for fifty-six deaths and damages estimated at more than $11 billion. Hurricane Hugo was clearly one of the most destructive storms of the twentieth century.

Less than a month later, on October 17, 1989, a major earthquake rocked the San Francisco Bay area. The quake, called Loma Prieta by geologists, shook the earth for about fifteen seconds with a force measuring 7.1 on the Richter scale. Severe damage was reported within a hundred-mile radius around the quake’s epicenter (located eight miles northeast of Santa Cruz). Tremors were felt several hundred miles beyond that point in all directions. The earthquake destroyed or damaged thousands of buildings. Roads cracked open and bridges crumbled. Natural gas and power lines snapped apart, and water pipes exploded. In all, the quake caused more than sixty deaths, thousands of injuries, and an estimated $7.1 billion in damages. The Loma Prieta Earthquake was the largest earthquake to occur along the San Andreas Fault since the 1906 San Francisco Earthquake (U.S. Geological Survey 1990), and it served as a wakeup call for the rest of the nation (U.S. Geological Survey 2010).

Almost three years after these incidents a major hurricane called Andrew smacked into the U.S. coastline about thirty-five miles south of Miami, Florida. On August 23, 1992, Andrew blasted the southern tip of Florida with sustained winds of 140 miles per hour and gusts of up to 164 miles per hour. The storm traveled quickly across the Florida peninsula, leveling virtually everything in its path. It continued to move in a west-northwesterly direction over the Gulf of Mexico. Early on August 25, Andrew made landfall again. This time it hit a sparsely populated section of southern Louisiana. Later that same day, the hurricane finally lost its punch as it moved northward, up through the south-central section of the United States. In its wake, Hurricane Andrew left hundreds of thousands of people homeless, and thousands more without power, water, communications, and sewer facilities. This compact, but extremely fierce, storm caused at least forty deaths and over $26 billion in property damages. Hurricane Andrew was one of the most destructive and expensive natural disasters to strike the U.S. mainland.

In 1993, another type of natural disaster hit the central portion of the United States. From April 1 to July 31, ten times the normal amount of rain fell in the central section of the nation, completely saturating the entire area. There was so much water that the Mississippi and Missouri Rivers were simply overwhelmed. The excess spilled over onto the surrounding land, creating enormous new lakes, rivers, and inland seas. Severe flooding was reported in nine states, stretching from Minnesota in the north to southeastern Missouri. The scope of the flooding was immense. Millions of acres of farmland were completely submerged; hundreds of highways, levees, and dams were washed away; thousands of residents were forced to leave their homes and farms. In all, the flooding caused forty deaths, and $10–15 billion in damages. The devastating overflow of the Mississippi and the Missouri Rivers has been referred to as the Great Midwest Flood of 1993.¹

A year after the 1993 floods, Mother Nature struck again—this time on the west coast. On January 17, 1994, an earthquake jolted the Los Angeles, California, area at 4:21 in the morning. The tremors lasted for about forty seconds, reaching a level of 6.6 on the Richter scale. Ironically, the quake occurred along a little known, unnamed fault, in the northwestern section of the city. Nevertheless, it inflicted severe damage on one of the nation’s most populated urban areas. Major freeways, bridges, and buildings crumbled into pieces; water pipes burst open; and electric wires snapped apart. The quake severed natural gas lines that, in turn, set off a number of serious fires throughout the surrounding neighborhoods. Thousands of residents lost their homes and personal belongings. The damages to property, buildings, highways, and so on, have been estimated at more than $30 billion. In addition, the quake killed sixty-one people and injured hundreds more. Experts say that this earthquake was not fierce enough to qualify as “The Big One.” But it definitely sent a wake-up call to the citizens of the city of Los Angeles, the state of California, and the rest of the nation. This disaster was the most costly earthquake to occur in the United States.

Then, in the summer of 2005, a massive storm called Hurricane Katrina slammed into the Gulf Coast region of the United States. Katrina first made landfall on the southeastern tip of Florida near the Broward-Dade county line as a Category One hurricane with winds measured at eighty miles per hour. Then, the storm moved toward the southwest through the unpopulated Everglades National Park, exiting the state on the southwestern tip of mainland Florida. For the next few days, Katrina stayed put in the waters of the Gulf of Mexico where it continued to build strength, intensify, and expand in size, becoming a Category Five hurricane. Then, it turned and began moving in a north, north-westerly direction toward the Gulf Coast states. Hurricane Katrina came ashore for a second time on Monday, August 29, near Buras, Louisiana. The huge storm continued to move over land in a north-northeasterly direction, bringing hurricane-force winds and rain to portions of Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama. Finally, the storm lost its strength in the Tennessee Valley and eventually died out over the eastern Great Lakes (U.S. Department of Commerce 2005b).

During its lifespan, Katrina caused an unimaginable amount of destruction. In Louisiana, the city of New Orleans sustained extensive damage. Storm surges (extreme rain and high winds) stressed the city’s levee system and several of the flood walls were overtopped or breached.

In turn, this led to catastrophic flooding. At one point, approximately 80 percent of the city of New Orleans was filled with water up to twenty feet deep. But this was not the only community affected by Katrina. The storm had an impact on large parts of the coastal areas across Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama, affecting nearly 93,000 square miles over 138 counties and parishes. Katrina devastated far more residential property than had any other recent hurricane. It destroyed many homes, buildings, forests, and vegetation and left behind an unprecedented amount of debris. Katrina was also responsible for broader demographic transformations. Over two million people were displaced from their homes; many were relocated to other places across the United States far away from the area. Although the storm hit in August 2005, disaster assistance funds are still flowing to the Gulf Coast (in 2011) to help communities and families recover. Hurricane Katrina has the dubious distinction of being the most disruptive, damaging, and costly natural disaster in American history.²

Major natural disasters, such as Hurricane Hugo, the Loma Prieta Earthquake, Hurricane Andrew, the Great Flood of 1993, the 1994 Los Angeles Earthquake, and Hurricane Katrina, place enormous and extraordinary burdens on the people who experience them. They generate problems and conditions that are difficult to anticipate, comprehend, and address. Individuals, families, and private organizations try to help citizens deal with the chaos and disruption. Their efforts are extremely important, but often woefully inadequate for disasters of these magnitudes. As a result, people turn naturally to the public sector for assistance. Government is the only institution with the resources and authority to help citizens cope with such cataclysmic events.

In the United States, the government has developed a formal system to deal with major disasters. This system is designed to guide official activity before, during, and after a disaster situation occurs. It identifies the basic objectives of governmental activity, as well as the policies and procedures that should be used to achieve these goals. The system also ties together the activities of all three levels of government, and coordinates the operations of various public and private organizations. Overall, this governmental response system strives to provide the most effective and efficient utilization of available resources.

The government relies upon this basic apparatus whenever and wherever a disaster strikes. In general, the system appears to work quite well. For the vast majority of disasters, the government is able to respond in a fairly routine manner. Public institutions use standard operating procedures to step in and provide relief to stricken areas. Little fanfare, commotion, or publicity surrounds these activities. In these situations, the governmental response is viewed as timely, appropriate, and successful.

Unfortunately, however, the governmental response does not always operate so smoothly or effectively. As Hurricane Hugo, the Loma Prieta Earthquake, Hurricane Andrew, and Hurricane Katrina demonstrated, some natural disasters generate severe environmental and societal disruptions. Public institutions find it extremely difficult to handle such situations. So, the government appears to react too slowly and haphazardly. In other instances, it mobilizes quickly, but subsequently cannot direct available resources to those who are truly in need. And in a few rare cases, the governmental response appears to be completely misguided. Public agencies fail to react swiftly or appropriately for the disaster situation at hand. In sum, the overall effectiveness of governmental efforts in dealing with major natural disasters is highly variable. This raises an interesting and important question: why is governmental performance in the area of disaster response so inconsistent? This book addresses precisely that question.

I argue that the answer does not lie solely in the structure of the governmental response system or in the nature of the disaster. Rather, it is the combination of these two factors. More specifically, the key to a successful governmental response depends upon the extent to which post-disaster human behavior corresponds to prior governmental expectations and planning. On the one hand, public organizations develop standard operating procedures, routine policies, and institutionalized processes that are supposed to address every possible contingency. These bureaucratic norms provide the foundation for the governmental response system. On the other hand, some disasters generate conditions that are unusually difficult, complicated, or stressful. During these situations, bureaucratic norms and institutionalized patterns of behavior simply do not seem to apply. Therefore, new or emergent norms develop to provide guidance and meaning to the affected population.

When the gap between these emergent norms and the pre-existing bureaucratic norms of the governmental system is quite large, the response process breaks down. This leads to widespread dissatisfaction with and criticism of governmental activities. However, when the disaster situation conforms to prior governmental expectations and planning, the gap between bureaucratic and emergent norms is relatively small. In these cases, public organizations are able to cope effectively with the disaster. Response and recovery operations proceed smoothly; little media or public attention is focused on these activities; and the entire governmental effort is perceived as successful. Thus, it is the size of the gap between the bureaucratic norms guiding governmental activity and the emergent norms arising within the affected population that determines the variability in governmental performance.

Varying sizes of the gap correspond to three alternative patterns of policy implementation. First, when the gap between emergent and bureaucratic norms is relatively small, governmental policies and procedures provide an appropriate guide to human behavior. Little confusion or delay occurs, and the government is able to react to the disaster situation in a relatively routine, straightforward manner. All relevant emergency management officials work together and perform their previously defined responsibilities. Governmental activity flows from the “bottom-up,” precisely as it was intended. The response “bubbles” up from the local level to the state and ultimately to the national government.

Second, other disasters produce a moderately-sized gap. Bureaucratic and emergent norms do not exactly agree with each other, but they are not entirely contradictory either. This leads to a situation in which no clear guidance for, or support of, governmental activities exists. A number of different actors and agencies at each level of government may try to take action. However, there is little or no coordination to these efforts, and it is difficult to tell exactly which (if any) level of government is responsible for the various relief and recovery operations. The result is a “confused” pattern of governmental activity.

Third, in some situations, bureaucratic procedures and patterns of human behavior diverge entirely from one another; consequently, the gap is extremely wide. In these disasters, the government simply cannot follow its standard operating procedures. The pre-established intergovernmental response framework is incapable of administering disaster relief. Local and state governments may be unable or unwilling to handle the crisis; the national government has to step in and take control of the entire effort. The normal bottom-up intergovernmental response pattern is supplanted by a top-down implementation process.

These three patterns of policy implementation for disaster relief—bottom-up, confused, and top-down—are extremely important. Although the details of specific natural disasters vary widely, almost all response efforts conform to one of these patterns. These three models provide clear illustrations of the government’s overall performance in this policy area. More specifically, the three patterns reveal the extent to which governmental plans match the needs and expectations of the affected population. Governmental responses that conform to the bottom-up process are most likely to be labeled successes, those that proceed in a confused, disorganized manner are usually viewed with mixed reactions, and those that follow the top-down pattern are generally perceived to be failures. Consequently, these three implementation patterns are used here to construct a framework for understanding the success or failure of the government’s natural disaster relief efforts.

The rest of the book is organized as follows: in Part One, I present the fundamental theoretical and analytical frameworks of the study. Chapter One examines two basic questions: (1) why are disasters viewed as legitimate public problems, requiring governmental action? and (2) what role should the government play in disaster-related activities? In order to answer these questions, Chapter Two compares disasters to other types of public problems and issues. Unlike situations in many other policy areas, citizens expect government to act when disaster strikes, and public beliefs about governmental intervention have had a significant influence on the development of disaster relief policy in the United States. Chapter Three examines the basic governmental approach to disasters in the United States, and it provides a brief overview of the historical development of governmental activity in this area. Then, I discuss the basic framework and structure of the current governmental disaster assistance system, looking at both the strengths and weaknesses of the government’s policy approach.

Chapter Four examines the two sets of norms that exist in every disaster situation: the bureaucratic norms that guide the governmental response process and the emergent norms that develop within the disaster-stricken population. Chapter Five uses these two sets of norms to construct a general framework for explaining the government’s disaster assistance efforts. Here, I focus on the key concept of the study. I argue that it is the size of the gap between bureaucratic norms and emergent norms that determines the predominant policy implementation pattern for emergency relief. More importantly, it is the size of the gap that accounts for the success or failure of the entire governmental relief effort.

In Part Two of the book, I provide detailed examples of eight natural disasters that have occurred over the past twenty years. These case studies illustrate the extreme variability of governmental activity in this policy area, including differences that arise when the same type of natural disaster successively strikes in different locations. In addition, they also show quite clearly the importance of the size of the gap in explaining the success or failure of the governmental response to natural disasters.

Part Three of the book summarizes and expands upon key points made earlier. Chapter Fourteen discusses the fundamental paradox of public policymaking in emergency management. When the government responds to disasters smoothly and effectively, its efforts receive little attention. However, when the response breaks down, governmental activity is highly publicized. Finally, Chapter Fifteen examines the most popular recommendations for improving the government’s disaster relief operations. In addition, it emphasizes the broader implications of this study. Governmental operations during natural disasters help us to understand the general limitations of public-sector activity during extraordinarily stressful conditions. And they also show the impact that bureaucratic actions, or inactions, during crisis situations can have on broader perceptio...