Evaluating the Process of Learning from Environmental Disasters
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Evaluating the Process of Learning from Environmental Disasters
- 1. Evaluating the Processes of Learning from Environmental Disasters David Alexander University College London
- 3. Analysis • registered • archived • forgotten • ignored Vulnerability maintained. - • utilised • adopted • learned Disaster risk reduced + Lessons Past events The process of disaster risk reduction (DRR)
- 4. Knowledge is enlightenment Knowledge is power* *Ipsa scientia potestas est
- 5. • individual and social knowledge • traditional and affective knowledge (Weber) • facts and values (Simon) • optimising and satisficing (Simon) • objective knowledge of bureaucracies and cultural knowledge of clans (Ouchi) • objective and tacit knowledge (Polanyi) • incremental and radical learning (March) • enduring and perishable information. Dichotomies in knowledge
- 6. Wisdom: ability to take decisions on the basis of principles, experience and knowledge Knowledge: understanding of how things function (or should function) Information: description of physical and social situations Data: basic facts and statistics COMMUNICATION DIKW pyramid
- 7. Improved safety Lesson learned Lesson to be learned • Unexpected event • New circumstance • Error • New practice Experience Change and innovation Recognition and comprehension
- 8. • general and specific lessons from major events • lessons from monitoring drills and exercises • cumulative experience of particular phenomena, practices or problems • lessons that arise from particular situations • lessons from human error and technical faults. Sources of lessons on disaster
- 9. • Rigorous, impartial, independent investigation of accidents • Recommendations for changes in rail safety were non-binding • Railway industry strongly resisted changes (e.g. better signalling, continuous brakes, electrical rather than gas lighting) • Trains without continuous braking survived in the UK into the 1970s • Crucial improvements resisted c. 60 years. UK HM Inspectorate of Railways (Board of Trade/Royal Engineers. 1840) (since 2005 HSE Rail Accident Investigation Branch)
- 10. Why are lessons not learned? • cost considerations • indifference or corruption • opposition from particular interests • accidental or wilful ignorance • political expediency • cultural rejection of DRR.
- 11. There is a common tendency to blame organisational failures on human error rather than systemic inadequacies. "Details are still sketchy, but we think the name of the bird sucked into the jet's engines was Harold Meeker"
- 12. Numberofcasualties Cost of retrofitting a building unreinforced completely reinforced completely reinforced largely unreinforced Cost of retrofitting a buildingCostperlifesaved Lack of incentive to "learn lessons"
- 13. A basis of theory
- 14. Knowledge of community vulnerability Knowledge of hazards and their impacts Knowledge of coping capacity and resilience Disaster Risk Reduction DRR
- 16. Governance: democratic participation in decision making Livelihoods: diversity and security Hazards and risks: disaster preparedness RESILIENCE: managing risks adapting to change securing resources Uncertain future: long-term trends climate change capacity to adapt
- 17. Large disaster Increased expenditure Return of complacency Risk-expenditure cycle Deaths, injuries, hardship, damage, disruption Review Reduced riskNo disaster Reduced expenditure Increased risk
- 18. Sadly, this is a good metaphor for current disaster risk reduction....
- 19. SUSTAINABILITY OF DISASTER RISK REDUCTION DAILY RISKS (e.g. food security, poverty) EMERGING RISKS (e.g. climate change, pandemics) GENERAL SUSTAINABILITY (e.g. lifestyles, economic activities, environment) MAJOR DISASTER RISKS (e.g. floods, drought, landslides, heatwaves)
- 20. In times of peace In times of crisis Organised non-structural protection Enhanced structural protection Planning, warning and preparedness Fusion with sustainability agenda
- 22. And what about the cultural acceptability or unacceptability of lessons....?
- 24. Cultural filter Risk management practices Benign Malignant Technology as a source of risk reduction Technology as an inadvertent source of risk Technology as a deliberate source of risk Ceaseless development of technology
- 26. INSTRUMENTS OF DISSEMINATION • mass media • targeted campaign • social networks • internet Augmentation MASS EDUCATION PROGRAMME SOCIAL CAPITAL HABIT CULTURE The creation of a culture of civil protection
- 28. Policy adoption Risk assessment • hazard • vulnerability • exposure Policy assessment • costs • benefits • consequences Disaster Expected losses Risk Policy Assessment
- 30. Source: Lam (2000) embrained encoded embeddedembodied Narrow learning, inhibited innovation Dynamic learning, radical innovation Superficial learning, limited innovation Cumulative learning incremental innovation Professional bureaucracy Machine bureaucracy Operating adhocracy 'J-form' organisation Professional model Bureaucratic model Occupational community model Organisational community model A classification of organisational learning
- 31. Active context (members' tools) After: Argote and Spektor (2011) Environmental context Latent organisational context Practical experience Knowledge Active organisational context
- 32. Evidence-based practice: the systematic use of lessons learned.
- 33. Enduring knowledge:- • fundamental concepts and procedures • consensus knowledge • information that reinforces, sustains and maintains existing practices "Perishable" knowledge:- • poorly collected and conserved 'transient' information • fruit of an organization's adaptation to rapid and profound change.
- 34. Evidence-based practice and maladaptive behaviour, Genova flash floods, November 2011 Ambulance
- 35. We tend to prepare for the last disaster, not the next one.
- 36. Preparation for nuclear war was a prime example of how lessons were not learned.
- 37. • the post-nuclear world...? • collapse of life-support systems • persistence of radiation • Hiroshima and Nagasaki no guide to modern nuclear war • preparations were preposterous Can we learn from this example?
- 38. Lessons of GEJET:- • complex • emergent • verified by future history • not yet accepted by all decision-makers or publics