Engineering and the social sciences: historical evolution of interdisciplinary approaches to hazard and disaster

Abstract

Beginning slowly in the late 1970s, but accelerating in the 1990s, scholars in the engineering and social sciences tried to work across theoretical and cultural-disciplinary gaps to understand disasters holistically and to provide the science needed for policies that reduce risk. Alliances of social scientists and engineers specializing in structural, ocean, and environmental engineering have tackled problems relating, for example, to earthquakes and tsunamis, while at the same time advancing studies of crosscutting ideas such as community resilience. Much of that alliance began not in the basic research or laboratory world, but with partnerships of scholars working at the focal point of hazard-oriented policy systems and public education. This paper considers how scholars, research centers, and funding agencies have worked to advance an integrated research agenda.