The legacy of vulnerability to floods in the Tana River, Kenya

Abstract

Floods are the most recurring, widespread, disastrous, and frequent natural hazards in the world. This paper aims to understand vulnerability among ethnic groups living in areas prone to floods because of historical development and implementation of laws and policies. I use the Tana River County in Kenya as a case study to answer the question: what role have economic development policies, laws, and their implementation played in the propagation of drivers of vulnerability through history? I apply the Integrated Approach to Natural Hazards by establishing the previous and current influence of economic development policies on physical, structural, and social dimensions of floods among the region's vulnerable inhabitants. Vulnerability to floods is the long-term culmination of enacted economic development policies and laws that can be ascertained through a review of historical records. To explore the historical narrative of Tana River County, I searched through archived county-specific historical records. To determine the present narrative, I collected data from inhabitants of purposively sampled villages of Tana Delta Sub-County using focus group discussions and I administered key informant interviews to government and non-governmental organizations located in Tana River County. I report that the implementation and institution of economic development policy and legal frameworks under both colonial and post-colonial governments have directly influenced physical, structural, and social dimensions of floods by both increasing vulnerability and producing new forms of vulnerability for floodplain inhabitants. This understanding is vital to local, national, and regional administrators involved in development and implementation of current and future hazard management strategies.