Rethinking Clinical Models and Coping with Disaster: An Ecological Point of View

Abstract

Clinical models, as in medicine and psychology, assume that the majority of people in a given setting are performing well, and that only a few are having trouble, due to personal deficits that can be alleviated by expert diagnosis and treatment . In parallel, on a larger scale for our communities and nations, coping with disaster assumes that a community is, on the whole, basically fine, although an occasional temporary disaster may occur. Such disasters can be alleviated by interventions, such a s help from neighboring communities, particularly those with expertise and ample resources. In times of prosperity and general good-will, and in times of rapid growth and development, this situation may be so. However, a broader point of view, i.e., tha t inspired by ecology and general systems theory, might find a different situation. In at least some situations, individuals, gr oups, communities, states, and even the globe itself, may not be performing well, particularly during natural disasters, physical cha nges, resource losses, and economic, social, and/or political declines. The faults, deficits, or disasters may lie not in individual s or component parts, but in the whole, that is, the larger system itself. The conceptual models, such as the clinical model, d epend upon economic good times, ample resources and good will and when those assumptions change, the model may no longer hold up. Interventions for individuals and disasters then, may require rethinking assumptions, as well as devising alternative approache s and revitalizing systems as on-going requirements.