Abstract
AbstractThere is a compelling argument that the number and intensity of disasters are increasing and will continue to do so for the foreseeable future. The causes are already evident. They include global climate change, increasing population density, human encroachment into disaster prone areas, recurrent famine, and the increasing intensity of weather events. Similarly, there is a general concern that the quality of the responses to these disasters is decreasing, particularly those causing the most damage. Recent examples include the Ebola epidemic, the Philippian tsunami, Hurricane Sandy, the Tibetan earthquake economic and famine refugee crises, and war-caused refugee situations around the world. Elements of the decrease in response quality include limited global logistics capacity, difficult inter-agency and/or international collaboration, and increased reliance on non-governmental organizations to provide the response. This essay is an appeal for more research on responder co-creation of and quality in the four broad phases of the disaster life cycle: mitigation, preparedness, response, and recovery.
Highlights
A person needs only to look at a newspaper, listen to a news broadcast, or view the nightly news to learn that the international humanitarian community is struggling to alleviate human suffering in many parts the world
The capacity to respond to these disasters is already stretched quite thin. This is reflected in many criticisms of the responses to recent disasters around the world
The position of this paper is that these criticisms highlight quality concerns since they indicate reductions from the potential value that can be provided to the victims of the disaster
Summary
A person needs only to look at a newspaper, listen to a news broadcast, or view the nightly news to learn that the international humanitarian community is struggling to alleviate human suffering in many parts the world. The value shortages stem from poor (or no) pre-planning or other mitigation efforts, inefficient supply chains, poor communication among the responders and other execution issues These manifestations of quality flaws point to a need for the responders to cocreate quality improvements in their response and reconstruction activities after a disaster. By 2008 the United Nations had developed a formal methodology for private participation in disaster response and had signed a contract with three international logistics companies The addition of these different organizations brought new resources and capabilities to the responses, but greatly increased coordination requirements [12,13] and the need for better management mechanisms [14]. The media and the public may be looking for exposure while some non-governmental organizations may want exposure to help them raise operating funds These different objectives make the development of a single measure of quality difficult.
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