Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Disaster management/Structure

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Contents 1 Structure 1.1 Option 1 1.2 Option 2 1.3 Option 3 1.4 Option 4 1.5 Option 5 1.6 Option 6 1.7 My comment 1.8 Voting for best option 2 Definition 2.1 Disaster Preparation nonsense 2.2 Assorted news 2.3 Disaster vs. Emergency 2.4 Redirect + Category:Disaster 2.5 Category renaming 2.6 Disasters and name and scope of project 2.7 "Disaster", defined 2.8 In scope?

[edit] Structure

Perhaps a good start is first to decide the overall framework, the following topics are off the top of my head:

[edit] Option 1

1. Threats, read here natural disaster or disaster.
2. Disaster managmenet
3. Emergency management
4. Emergency preparedness
5. Disaster recovery
6. Business continuity planning (noticed this was outside your stated scope however worth at least a mention as a 'See Also')Revmachine21 13:10, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Option 2

I almost agree. I still see that structure lacking in intuitivity. I would prefer:

1. Diaster management (i.e. policy/theory, as well as business continuity?)
   1. Mitigation,
   2. Preparedness,
   3. Response,
   4. Recovery
2. Emergency services
   1. Emergency management (of emergency services?)
   2. Civil defence
   3. Police etc.
3. Hazards
   1. Tropical cyclones
   2. Dirty bombs
   3. etc.
4. Disasters
   1. Hurricane katrina
   2. Bali bombing
   3. etc.

--Drdan 13:51, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Option 3

The second framework is better, I think, but there are some modifications I would make to it. I propose the following:

1. Emergency/Diaster management (i.e. the four phases and their descriptions)
   1. Mitigation,
      1. Risk Assessment
   2. Preparedness,
   3. Response,
      1. Local Emergency Services (EMS, Fire, Police)
      2. State and Federal Response (State EM Agencies, Dept. of Homeland Security, FEMA)
   4. Recovery
2. Natural Disasters (What was identified above as "Hazards")
   1. Tropical cyclones
3. Technilogical Disasters (Another division of the above "Hazards")
   1. Dirty bombs
4. Past Disasters
   1. Hurricane katrina
   2. Bali bombing
   3. etc.

I put the above comments under a new heading to seperate discussion of the framework from other issues mentioned above. Developing a framework is, I think, a discussion that merits its own heading. Anyone disagree? -- backburner001 05:25, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Option 4

I am very close to an agreement now. However, there are only three of us discussing this. We should try to get more interested parties involved. My suggestion based on yours:

1. Emergency/Diaster management (i.e. the four phases and their descriptions)
   1. Mitigation,
      1. Risk Assessment
   2. Preparedness,
   3. Response,
      1. Local (i.e. emergency services)
      2. National (Provincial and federal agencies, Dept. of Homeland Security, FEMA)
      3. International
   4. Recovery
2. Natural Hazards (The hazard is the phenomenon, the disaster its consequence)
   1. Tropical cyclones
3. Man-made Hazards
   1. Dirty bombs
4. Disasters (Probably also divided into man-made and natural)
   1. Hurricane katrina
   2. Bali bombing
   3. etc.

Our subject is extra sensitive to systemic bias towards the North American perspective. We have to adopt a structure that allow the inclusion of all Points Of View, which I think the above does. --Drdan 07:18, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

I agree that we must avoid systemic bias toward the North American perspective, which is something I hadn't thought of when making my outline. I think this framework is general enough to accomplish that and I'll try to make sure I include other perspectives in my future contributions.

Perhaps the only technical modification I would make are the following two:

To Section 1.3 (Response)

• • Response,
    • Local (i.e. emergency services)
    • Provincial/State (I would classify provincial action here since provinces are subsets of Canada as states are in the U.S.)
    • National (Federal/National agencies; such as the DHS or FEMA in the U.S.)
    • International

In response to Section 2, I believe (but I will check my references) that hazards are technically defined as potential sources of harm and that disasters (or emergencies on a smaller scale) are tehcnically defined as the consequence. For a rough example, a hazard may be a crack in the sidewalk that may cause someone to fall; an emergency is the result of tripping over the crack and being injured.

In Section 3, let's keep the heading of this one gender-nuetral to maintian NPOV. Technological Hazards/Disasters describe things made by human beings without the subtle gender bias that still presents itself in some of our language. Otherwise, this is a very nice framework. -- backburner001 15:51, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Option 5

I am mulling over the difference between public (i.e. government) versus private (i.e. company) disaster management... please tweak to improve, me so tired I can't think straight:

1. Emergency/Diaster management (I see this as a public function)
   1. Mitigation,
      1. Risk Assessment
   2. Preparedness,
   3. Response,
      1. Local (i.e. emergency services)
      2. National (Provincial and federal agencies, Dept. of Homeland Security, FEMA)
      3. International
   4. Recovery
2. Operational risk management under which Business Continuity Planning falls (I see this as a private function)
   1. Threats and vulnerabilities
   2. Impact assessments
   3. Recovery preparation
   4. Crisis Management
   5. Recovery
   6. Resumption of business as usual
3. Natural Hazards (The hazard is the phenomenon, the disaster its consequence)
   1. Tropical cyclones
4. Man-made Hazards
   1. Dirty bombs
5. Disasters (Probably also divided into man-made and natural)
   1. Hurricane katrina
   2. Bali bombing
   3. Public relations disaster (Tylenol poisioning incident in the 80's, could have been a PR disaster but because managed well by company, a corporate disaster was averted. This example included for thought provoking.)
   4. etc.

Let's take Section 3 and include it in Section 1. The sub-points you identified for BCP will fall nicely under the four phases of emergency management (perhaps with different names, since business continuity addresses things from a different perspective). Then, in the (Disaster/Emergency) management article (depending on what final title we choose) can focus on the public aspects, but make mention of the private (read: business) aspects. We can add a reference to the top of Section 1 in the article that refers readers to the main article on BCP (since a larger discussion of BCP merits another article altogether) and apply this same framework to the BCP article with modifications made for emphasis on emergency management as it is applied to business continuity. How does that sound? -- backburner001 16:01, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Option 6

Still thinking over the 2nd part of your suggestion about moving Op Risk under Section 1. I'm beginning to wonder if we are trying to merge too much into a single outline and that we should focus on theory areas / methodologies rather than the process under a particular theory / method. Our article can have a simple outline like this, with a 30,000 foot description of each method, with links to the detailed article that fleshes out the process associated with the theory / method. I the following article title

Disaster management

1. Hazards
   1. Natural disasters
   2. Man-made disasters
2. Disaster management methodologies
   1. Crisis Management
   2. Emergency Management
   3. Disaster Recovery
   4. Operational risk management
   5. Business Recovery Management
   6. Continuity of Operations Revmachine21 13:46, 12 April 2006 (UTC)
3. Disaster management professionals
   1. First responders
   2. State/provincial
   3. Federal
   4. Public infrastructure
   5. Private companies

The stregnths of the above structure (1) hazards vs. disasters is explained, (2) the methodologies are summarized, (3) the methodologies point to separate articles that explain the detailed process behind the method, (4) summaries the Disaster Management profession from different angles. Revmachine21 13:46, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sold on this framework. Here are the problems I see with the strengths you identified:

1. Setting up this point by making disasters a subset of hazards (and then describing different types of disasters) doesn't lend itself to definition of terms, it lends itself to avoiding the conceptual basis of emergency/disaster management by delving right into specifics.
2. I would only agree with this if there were significant differences between these methodologies. The only two significantly different methodologies I see here are the differences between Disaster/Emergency Management and Business Continuity Planning.
3. We can accomplish this in the frameworks mentioned above.
4. See my response to point #2 above.

Also, by classifying the different types of professionals under a seperate section, I think we will loose sight of describing their professional duties and where they function from an emergency/disaster management perspective.

In other words, it's a good try, but I'd prefer to stick with what we have above. -- backburner001 14:08, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

Fortunately, I'm not married to any option. If the preference goes a different way, no vociferous objections from me. One thing tho, can we leave the decision a little longer? Would like input from Proto and Taxman. Doesn't mean however that option 6 isn't the best :-) but hey small issues are small issues. Revmachine21 10:13, 13 April 2006 (UTC)

I'm certainly not opposed to letting the discussion continue until Proto, Taxman, and any others who are interested have given their input. Small issues often turn into big issues, so I agree that they should be handled appropriately. -- backburner001 16:14, 13 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] My comment

Though I feel very confident in my knowledge of policy/political side of disater management, I am not at all familiar with BCP (probably should be) - this is influencing my opinion. Furthermore, we are really only discussing a conceptual outline. We only have to agree upon the top two layers. If this will be our main article it will still be short with links to the main articles. I hence take the same stance as backburner001 and support Option 4 with the modifications. Though I do like the idea in Option 6 of only having three top headings: Mgmt Theory, Emergency services/professionals, Hazards/Disasters

Re: Hazard and Impact. The references on our main page support the model that Hazard * Vulnerability = Risk. Where 'Risk' is (depending who you ask) a likelihood of the occurance of a disaster with a given impact/size/consequence. Please add your central references to the Bibliography list (I am particularly interested in BCP).

Last, I am afraid that I will only be able to log on a few times the next two weeks. So please be bold and so forth, i.e. don't wait for me! --Drdan 15:18, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Voting for best option

Sign your name against the option you prefer. Revmachine21 13:46, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

Option 1
Option 2
Option 3
Option 4

• backburner001 14:10, 12 April 2006 (UTC) - Option 4 with slight modifications as mentioned above.
• Drdan 15:18, 12 April 2006 (UTC) As per my motivation above.
• Epolk 17:40, 31 August 2006 (UTC) - I also like Option 4. It seems to be fairly comprehensive without becoming cluttered.

Option 5
Option 6

• Revmachine21 13:46, 12 April 2006 (UTC) - Option 6 is my preferred item.

[edit] Definition

[edit] Disaster Preparation nonsense

I have seen the term Disaster preparation being used in the categorisation. It is obviously totally wrong. The only situation where disasters are prepared are when terrorists and invading armies plot their dirty deeds. I should put up on the to-do list to exterminate the expression from wikipedia. Though the expression could be replaced by preparedness, it would be more correct to use disaster management or something similar.

• Category:Disaster preparation

In fact, the categorisation hierarchy needs to be looked over in accordance with the final result of our vote above. --Drdan 08:54, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Assorted news

I laugh at myself when I keep returning to wiki. I should be working :)

Anyway, a couple of comments:

The use of the word 'disaster'

There are several articles (e.g. Sago mine disaster) where the word 'disaster' in the title has been discussed as being a weasel-word. The argument raised is that one should use a gradual (subjective!) range of 'incident', 'accident', and 'disaster'. I find the discussion and choice of word irrelevant, but we should create a standard.

Classification of hazards

The hazards category is messy and missing a lot of articles. The structure that I would like to use, which could affect our discussion above as well, is: Social hazards (war, riot, stampede, shooting), Technological hazards (Meltdown, transportation, dam failure), and natural hazards. This gets us around the use of the gender-charged man-made as well. Any comments?

Changed signature

FYI, to make my signature fit better with my username I decided to make some changes (former Drdan)

--rxnd ( t | € | c ) 09:13, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Disaster vs. Emergency

Though this project is just at its start we have a huge problem in structuring it. All the central terminology is used without standard e.g disaster mgmt/emergency mgmt, preparedness/preparation, hazard/disaster.

The first term is obviously important to sort out for our project. Is it Disaster management or Emergency management? My suspicion is that disaster management is more common in academia and possibly also in Europe. Emergency management tend to refer to the 'response phase' activities, i.e. emergency services. We need to define these terms among ourselves before we get too far to do anything about it. Should we use the term 'Disaster management' or is 'Emergency management' better? Does it matter? rxnd ( t | € | c ) 18:18, 25 April 2006 (UTC)

My impressions differ from yours on a couple of points. It doesn't seem to me like "disaster management" is more common in academia. Emergency management is a relatively new academic feild to begin with. Also, the institution I attend, which refers to it as emergency management, is the only university in the state of Ohio that offers an accredited program in the discipline. I cannot, however, speak on which of the two references are more common in Europe. In regard to your definition of emergency management as a phrase directed more toward response, I have to disagree. At least in my course of study, emergency management has referred to all of the phases involved in addressing emergencies/disasters.

Personally, I think we're splitting hairs in defining disaster management and emergency management as phrases with different meanings. Both refer to the same concepts; they both refer to the management of hazards that have developed into harmful events. The only slight nuance in using the terms may be one of scale (namely, does the word "disaster" somehow imply a large-scale incident whereas "emergency" may imply a smaller event). However, the nuance simply does not seem to exist from what I have seen in discussions about emergency/disaster management. I suggest we choose the name that is most widely used and re-direct the other phrase to the chosen phrase's article. -- backburner001 23:13, 25 April 2006 (UTC)

That sounds good to me as well and I have to admit that 'emergency management' definitely has a wider usage outside academia and I find it more descriptive. Conclusion: A redirect from the Disaster management article to the new Emergency management article? BTW I have been part of three European Unis and two of them referred to it as Disaster management with the third calling it Hazard geography. I have been involved with institutions in Colorado and Massachusets, the first one used EM and the second DM. Bottom line, they are the same and we should stick with Emergency management as the main article. --rxnd ( t | € | c ) 23:34, 25 April 2006 (UTC)

I have no problem with sticking to the emergency management article. I certainly think that we should acknowledge, in that article, that disaster management is another widely used phrase (this could also help in adding a global perspective to the tone of the article). In any event, unless another project member has an objection to it, I think a re-direct is in order. -- backburner001 14:34, 26 April 2006 (UTC)

I would also support EM over DM. DM is more commonly used by those that don't work in the field, e.g. the general populace. --Rediguananz 05:46, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

I respectfully disagree that it's "splitting hairs". While recently the terms were used interchangably, I think that had more to do with a misappropriation of the terms in a new field, than any true equality of meaning. Disaster does address a large-scope by (US English) definition, where emergency just indicates an immediate need. Moreover, as the Emergency Manager position becomes more and more standardized under DHS influence, I think the United States will see the terms being used more appropriately. There IS a distinct difference between an emergency and a disaster (regardless of which word your jurisdiction uses to describe each). I think we should always be careful to make that separation distinct, and be consistent about it.

...and yes, I agree with EM over DM. I perceive a disaster as a specific type of emergency. Parradoxx 10:36, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Redirect + Category:Disaster

I have now redirected disaster management to emergency management. To reflect this change in the categorisation I think that Category:Disaster should be renamed to Category:Emergency management. Any comment? --rxnd ( t | € | c ) 07:22, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Category renaming

I have now entered Category:Disaster and the tree starting with Category:Disaster preparation for renaming to 'Emergency management' and 'Disaster preparedness'. Follow this link to join the discussion. --rxnd ( t | € | c ) 21:37, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

Done. -- backburner001 02:03, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Disasters and name and scope of project

Hi there. I'm quite excited to discover this project, but wanted to check that there isn't another one covering the same area. My background is really in categorisation - back in September 2005 I did a big overhaul of the Disasters and Natural disasters categories, and today I created Category:Disasters by year, which is now a subcategory of Category:Events by year and Category:Disasters and has now subsumed all the "<YEAR> disasters" categories.

But I'm not entirely clear if I'm in the right place. I might be looking for something like "WikiProjects:Disasters", but this is the closest I've found. The name and much of the discussion seems to be focussed on disaster management and the jobs and theory behind preparing for and dealing with disasters, but the scope of the project also says it includes: "...the phenomenological description of natural and man-made hazards. It also include individual disastrous events, e.g. hurricane Katrina and the Ethiopian famine in the 1980s."

Would I be right to say that "the phenomenological description of natural and man-made hazards" is covered in Category:Natural hazards and Category:Hazards? And that "individual disastrous events" is covered by Category:Disasters? These areas would seem to overlap with history wikiprojects and wikiprojects on natural phenomena, but if this wikiproject is the right place to work on them, that would be great. So is this the right place? Carcharoth 09:36, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] "Disaster", defined

How are we defining disaster? I understand it as "an emergency whose response requirements exceed the capabilities of the local response groups & agencies" - that its, one where outside help has to be brought in. --Badger151 21:34, 20 October 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps we should follow the way of Emergency management, which was receently renamed from Disaster management - if this was WikiProject Emergency management, then emergency would be easily definable. I mean, do the October 11, 2006 New York City plane crash or the PEPCON disaster count as disasters? Blood red sandman 21:42, 20 October 2006 (UTC)

That make a lot of sense. I agree. --Badger151 22:29, 20 October 2006 (UTC)

It's also a spectrum of scale problem. This sort of thing is a spectrum that grades gradually from a few people and a small area, to large areas and millions of people. At one end of the scale you have accidents and emergencies, and at the other end of the scale you have disasters and extinction events. The basic idea of covering what happened and how people prepare for this sort of thing is the same, though the details vary immensely with scale. Carcharoth 11:38, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

The problem is that there is no clearly defined structure for escalation of events. Legal definitions also vary from country to country. E.g. in New Zealand the largest event is a 'Nationally Declared Civil Defence Emergency'. Accidents (e.g. motor vehicle accidents etc) are generally outside the scope of disaster/emergency management in that routine emergency serice arrangements are capable of handling the event. You're right in that there is a scale of events - however there is not a consistent scale, and there are two types 1) the size of the event itself, such as earthquake magnitudes, and 2) the scale of the impact upon society. The same size earthquake may have significantly different impacts on two similar sized communities depending on the extent of development, building technology, legislation etc. Accident, emergency, crisis, disaster, incident - unfortunately these terms are often used interchangeably and aspects of one have muddied into each other. It might be useful to start a page just to attempt to define these terms (even just in a discussion page) before we go much further. The research definitions of disaster for example are extremely wide and variable. --Rediguananz 21:32, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

And seeing what the Wikipedia process has managed to produce can be interesting:

• accident
• emergency
• accident and emergency
• crisis
• incident
• disaster

Some of these may be disambiguation pages (haven't looked yet), but you get the idea. Anything writing about these concepts will end up linked to these pages, so they need to be knocked into shpae, or at least relevant sections added so that emergency management definitions of the terms are made clearer. Carcharoth 23:11, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

There was a really lengthy process around this issue when some people (myself included) wanted to change "Chernobyl accident" to Chernobyl disaster. Have a look at the talk page archives for that article if you want to see some of the arguments which came up. For the purposes of this discussion you can safely ignore the speculation/conspiracy theories about whether it was an accident at all, but the point is broader than that and the discussion might be of interest. – Kieran T ^{(talk | contribs)} 23:50, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] In scope?

Haditha killings was added as under this wikiproject by Blood red sandman (here) who I see is an active member per above. I'm a bit confused as to why this would be considered in scope. I guess the massacare/killings is a PR disaster for the US but is that the intention of the project? The article is largely about the incident (including evidence suggesting this was a massacare by US troops rather then one by a IED) and the purported coverup and reactions to the incident, not about the management of the lives of those affliated with those who were killed or injured Nil Einne 14:46, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

There would have been some management, from local emergency services etc. The fact that that aspect is not currently covered makes it all the more important that it is included in this project, as it requires us to track down info and sources relating to the management side, and add them to the article. Blood red sandman 15:47, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

I don't agree that the disaster management aspects (local emergency services) are major enough parts of the incident to warrant labelling the article as something this WikiProject should be concerned with. I also think the confusion arises because wars and massacres appear under Category:Disasters in the category structure (under the man-made disasters bit, obviously), but many of these articles are more concerned with the historical aspect, rather than the disaster management aspect. We really need to distinguish properly between the "historical" and "management" aspects of disasters. Have a look at Portal:Disaster for examples of this. Carcharoth 16:05, 27 December 2006 (UTC)