Long-Term Disaster Resilience
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Long-term disaster resilience Vol. 1 Executive Summary and Recommendations Vol. 2 Long-term disaster resilience: Full report Vol. 3 Long-term disaster resilience: Literature review Authorship and Acknowledgement This research project is the result of a partnership between Women’s Health Goulburn North East (WHGNE), Women’s Health In the North (WHIN), and Monash University Disaster Resilience Initiative (MUDRI) with significant funding from the National Disaster Resilience Grants Scheme (NDRGS). Additional funding was gratefully received for an additional 10 interviews from the Lord Mayor’s Charitable Foundation. Our heartfelt appreciation goes to the women and men who participated in this research, sharing their experiences, their expertise, and their intelligent and thoughtful appraisal of long- term disaster resilience. The recommendations in the report emerge from their narratives and suggestions. Our sincere thanks to members of the Research Advisory Group: Emeritus Prof. Frank Archer (Chair, Monash University), Susie Reid (WHGNE), Helen Riseborough (WHIN), Dr Rob Gordon, Prof. Bob Pease (University of Tasmania, Deakin University), Assoc. Prof. Lisa Gibbs (University of Melbourne), Steve O'Malley (MFB), Susan Davie (Vic. SES), Tricia Hazeleger, Andrew Wilson- Annan, Jodie Thorneycroft, Naomi Bailey (Common Cause Consulting), Andrew Wilson (EMV), Tegan Brown (DELWP), Rachel Bessell (CFA), Daryl Taylor, Amanda Lamont (AIDR). Thanks to Helen Goodman and Jenny Indian in co-conducting far-flung interviews; Judy Jeffrey for her expert recruitment co-ordination; and Jemma Dinning for specialist advice. Deep appreciation to our critical friends. Report written by Debra Parkinson, Alyssa Duncan and Jaspreet Kaur. © Gender and Disaster Pod, WHGNE, Wangaratta, 2018 Logo taken from Ona Henderson’s Girl with a Possum, (03) 9712 0393. Front cover image, Bringer of the Dawn by Ona Henderson. This material/publication was produced with funding provided by the Australian Government in partnership with the States and Territories under the National Partnership Agreement for National Disaster Resilience. Gender and Disaster Pod, 2018 www.genderanddisaster.com.au Page 2 Contents Introduction................................................................................................................................ 4 Background and significance ...................................................................................................... 4 Aims ............................................................................................................................................ 5 Research design and ethics ........................................................................................................ 6 How to read this report ............................................................................................................ 12 Resilience – ‘Bloody buzzwords’ ................................................................................. 12 Resilience Scale ........................................................................................................................ 16 Findings – Part 1: Perceptions of disasters’ significance .......................................................... 20 Aren’t you over it yet?................................................................................................. 20 What happened ........................................................................................................... 22 A defining moment ...................................................................................................... 28 No getting over it ........................................................................................................ 28 Long-term consequences of the disaster .................................................................... 29 Findings – Part 2: What helps and hinders resilience? ............................................................ 43 What helped resilience? .............................................................................................. 43 What hindered resilience? .......................................................................................... 56 Heightened gender expectations hindered resilience ................................................ 64 Findings – Part 3: Disaster planning for self, family, children and community ........................ 78 Children in disaster areas ............................................................................................ 78 Family obligations can endanger lives ........................................................................ 91 Disaster plans .............................................................................................................. 92 Discussion ................................................................................................................................. 99 Conclusion ................................................................................................................. 112 References .............................................................................................................................. 115 Appendices ............................................................................................................................. 119 Ideas for future preparations .................................................................................... 130 GAD Pod 2018 www.genderanddisaster.com.au Page 3 If blood will flow when flesh and steel are one Drying in the colour of the evening sun Tomorrow's rain will wash the stains away But something in our minds will always stay … On and on the rain will fall Like tears from a star On and on the rain will say How fragile we are (Gordon Sumner, ‘Fragile’, October 13, 1987) Introduction Long-term disaster resilience is influenced by a multitude of factors associated with the disaster itself and the long and pressured aftermath. Other traumatic life events and mental and physical ill-health contribute. Class, gender, race, sexuality and ability will also impact on capacity for resilience. It is clear from the interviews that experiences at the time of the disaster and the way the immediate aftermath is managed have a profound effect on women’s and men’s resilience. The literature review identified the dearth of scholarship in long-term disaster resilience, and this study begins to address this absence. It is unique in capturing the voices of disaster survivors as informants spoke of disaster events nine, 10, 30 or 50 years in the past. Memories swiftly took them back to the day of the disaster and the way they felt. Equally vivid were recollections of powerlessness and sometimes anger at how they were treated when they were at their most vulnerable. This predominantly qualitative research into long-term disaster resilience identifies protective factors and what helps and hinders individual and community resilience in disasters. It documents the experiences and wisdom of disaster survivors nine years after the 2009 Black Saturday fires to more than 50 years after earlier fires and floods in Victoria, including the 1983 Ash Wednesday fires. The purpose is to identify how individuals and communities understand the risk to long-term health and wellbeing that disaster experience brings, and how to promote resilience over decades. Background and significance One in six Australians has a lifetime risk of disaster (MacFarlane, 2005) and one in three experiences disaster warnings (Reser, 2012). The CSIRO (2016) advises that the duration, frequency and intensity of heat events have increased and The Climate Institute (2016) confirms a trend towards increased extreme fire weather and longer fire seasons, noting that ‘instead of a ‘catastrophic’ blaze every 30 years … [Victoria] could face the prospect of a ‘Black Saturday’ level event every two or three years’. Yet, little research documents men’s and women’s reflections on their own recovery and that of their communities over a span of decades. While much research has been conducted into the mental health effects on survivors, particularly on clinical GAD Pod 2018 www.genderanddisaster.com.au Page 4 diagnoses such as Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), research into the social impacts for men and women long after disaster experience is rare. A literature review conducted by Monash University Disaster Resilience Initiative (MUDRI) confirms the dearth of literature on long-term disaster resilience in Australia. (See Volume 3.) Resilience applies not only to the experience of the disaster itself, but equally to the long aftermath. Many survivors struggle to overcome the layers of pressure and seemingly insurmountable barriers that accompany the loss of family members, community, homes, pets, livestock, property, landscape and sense of place. Further pressure emerges from interruption to services and damaged infrastructure. This research has the potential to lead to positive change in equipping individuals and communities for resilience in disasters and their aftermath. Equally, it will inform the emergency management sector and its policy directions on how resilience is fostered over decades. Previous research, up to five years after disaster experiences, suggests that disaster impacts can be severe and long-lasting, and that more salient gender norms exacerbate recovery (Enarson & Morrow, 1998; Enarson & Pease, 2016; Hoffman, 1998; Parkinson, 2017; Zara, Parkinson, Duncan and Joyce, 2016). In the US,