The Current Situation of Public Safety Incidents and Its Cause

ICPM-2012. Crisis Management in the Time of Changing World

Zhao Xiuhua School of Marxism Studies, Renmin University of China. Beijing, P.R.China, 100872 (Email: [email protected])

Abstract security-related issues, and the work of comparison and reference is not enough. As for The study of the current situation of our the concept of "public safety", different country and its cause is necessary to cut back scholars give different interpretations from public safety problems. According to the different angles. For example, Xiao Yang, national situation, the cause of public safety’s from the Law point of view, pointed out that, hidden danger can be considered from the “Public safety is something that intentionally following five perspectives: Natural causes, or negligently implements certain behavior Economic factors, Political factors, which is enough to harm the lives of most Technological factors and Cultural awareness people or major private property.” Scholars factors. These five aspects interact, and Deng Guoliang think that, Public safety crises together frame the reasons of public safety of natural disasters, man-made catastrophes issues in China. In this paper, I combine and social conflicts caused by social research methods of observation and literature confrontation behavior, which endanger public review. The innovation of this paper is to make safety, cause or may cause serious harm to the classification of the public safety problems society. Some scholars believe that the public problemsproblems cause, and make the safety has a narrow and broad sense. Other incentives analysis with a full detail. scholars believe that, public safety issue is the scope of public goods, something that offered KeyWords: Public safety, incidents, current by government with public power. It is obvious situation, cause that, the view above understand public safety from different perspective. But this often limits 1. Introduction to a certain point of view and makes problem fragmented, can not show us the overall public Based on the existing information collection of safety problems and their severity. As Wang public safety, books dedicated to public safety Yanji from Renmin University of China said research are rare. However, the paper has a that, with the opening up and development of huge number. Especially with the increasing the society, public safety’s constituent number of public events in recent years, the elements and mechanism of action tends to be number grows bigger and bigger. A series of complex. Its connotation and extension will research papers on the importance of public continue to expand, and it is undergoing a safety, deficiencies and problems in the change from quantity to quality. The existing management of public safety and public safety research focuses on the following aspects: system. Things should be noted that, Most of First of all, the study focused on the the focus of the study of these papers is on one classification and features of. According to the aspect of public safety issues or aspects or public time, the nature and mechanism, they different emphasis. Thorough, in-depth divide public safety as natural disasters, research paper on public safety issues is few. accidents, public health emergencies, and Moreover, most of these papers is studying the social security events, the four major country's public security issues, while involve categories. This classification is rather very few such problems abroad. Only a handful scientific overall, but it should be based on the of articles involve foreign public times required to focus and highlight, such as,

economic crisis, a serious lack of resources, the stampede of Miyun Beijing in 2004, the energy and the necessities of life, the financial frequent occurrence of Coal Mine Safety credit crisis and so on. events, the milk powder incident of Anhui Secondly, scholars have different focus on Fuyang, Wenchuan Earthquake of 2008, all the reason of public safety. For example, these are big endangering Public safety Professor Wu Aiming summarized them as: incidents. Modern Risks and threats are rising world-wide terror activities, a wide range of while traditional security threats still. Public infectious diseases, frequent occurrence of safety issue has become a serious obstacle to natural disasters, sudden major personal building a socialist harmonious society in casualties and the harm caused by the poor of China. the illegal production and shoddy products. It is worth pondering that this situation has Scholars Lin Xiongdi put it summed up the not being attached importance. The protecting natural, political, economic, cultural awareness base is relatively weak and out of the pace of and ethnic and religious five aspects. All these economic development. These constraints the analysis is reasonable to some extent, but the comprehensive, coordinated and sustainable defect is lack of uniform sstandards and focus. development of national economy, On the But paid insufficient attention to the impact of other hand, “with the development of globalization for public safety. Involve a economic and social, people’s expectations of relatively few individuals for the event to vent the masses of security is increasing. How to their anger on social discontent, economic minimize security incidents and the resulting security events and foreign-related incident. loss has become a prominent issue to build a But the fact is that these factors are precisely harmonious socialist society.”[2] the important factors that public safety can not be ignored. 2. Cause Analysis Thirdly, scholars have different views of countermeasures. Wang Yan scholars have 2.1．Natural Causes pointed out that, development of social and public security system should be in line with It is an important factor in public safety our community policing, and give play to the incidents that natural disasters are difficult to functions of public and social organizations, safeguard. China is a natural disaster-prone re-integrate the elements of public safety, and country. The data indicates that more than a build a government management and public dozen cities in our country are facing one or participation in the combination of social and more kinds of threat form natural disasters. mercerization of public security system. It China has more earthquakes than other should be acknowledged that the relevance of countries, which are frequent, magnitude, and these recommendations are very strong and of widely distributed. Since 1998, occurred 8 great practical significance, but they are either earthquakes above 7 magnitude and more than too general, or just about a specific aspect of 40 earthquakes above 6magnitude. Statistics some of the most important countermeasures, show that, meteorological disasters has brought they lack maneuverability. In fact, the public 2114600000000 direct economic losses to safety system is a complex engineering; It China's national economy the between 1993 needs a comprehensive plan as well as specific and 2003. In 1991, catastrophic floods caused and feasible measures, which are closely linked severe urban loss. 22 cities in Jiangsu province with its causes. Therefore, this article focuses suffered disaster, nearly 30,000 enterprises on the analysis of the reasons of public safety stopped or half cut and 6,170,000 houses issues. collapsed. [3] Moreover, Greenhouse effect In the light of international data, the period and El Niño Phenomenon caused by air when the capita GDP is between $1000 and pollution and environmental degradation will $3000 is high incidence of public safety be a growing threat to human life and property incidents.”[1] Our country is into this phase safety. The increasing difficulty in when new concepts collides old ones and withstanding natural disasters must be attached social structure changes. All these lead to great importance. Imbalance in distribution, moral losing its exemplary role and society being in an unstable state. The outbreak of SARS in 2003,

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2.2．Economic Factors insurance, safety accident rate also have no choice but rise. Disharmony in economy is the root cause of Opposed to poverty, sometimes wealth will the induced public safety incidents. Observed become a safety hazard. Security incidents from the international statistics, public safety occurred in the transportation, tourism is often incidents will increase when per capita GDP is caused by wealth rather than poverty. Along in 1000 - $ 3000. [4] During this period, the with the improving of people's material and economy has entered a stage of rapid cultural living standards, people are more development while unstable social factors interested in public events, travelling and increase. At the same time, China's private cars will increase. But they have not development gap between urban and rural developed the good habit of always safety first. areas is widening in this period, in 2000, the Moreover, along with the accelerated process per capita income of eastern part was 2.26 of urbanization and urban modernization, the times that of the western ones. The gap city's population concentration and between the highest province and the lowest concentration of production is rising sharply. provincial is more above three times, and the This concentration brings us high productivity averages masked the actual difference. but also new risks. The city's high-rise Actually, our income Gina coefficient has been buildings and intensiveness of Oil, gas, water, above 0.50, much higher than the usual social electricity and other critical facilities will cause stability cordon 0.40. [5] Too large gap in a chain reaction once some security incident income distribution will have a severe impact takes place. on people's thoughts, beliefs and value systems, 2.3. Political factors and give threat to social security and stability. First of all, poverty will aggravate the To some extent, government’s inaction security risks due to the widening gap between exacerbated the severity of the Public Security. rich and poor. Enormous pressure on family The Seventeenth Party Congress proposed to economy is an important reason for the build a service-oriented government. This is individual security incidents. Maslow's because the Government's duty is to provide hierarchy of needs theory suggests that people the community with high - quality public will rarely consider the security needs under goods and to create a comfortable and safe the premise of survival are not guaranteed. In working environment for people. In accordance most cases, the victims of security incidents are with the Public Security Products theory, the vulnerable groups, the majority of which are safety issue means that Government provides forced by the need of livelihood to labor in services to citizens with public power, and this extremely dangerous circumstances. So this is part of the scope of public goods. The situation is more apparent in safety accidents frequency of public safety accident illustrates of production. Now, while the technology is of the intentional or unintentional omission of developing at a high rate, the need of labor is government. This is mainly manifested in the relatively reducing. But the number of labor to following two aspects: be in employment on the market is definitely In the objective aspect, there are still many increasing. Competition for jobs is becoming loopholes in government management of more and much fiercer. To ordinary citizens, public safety. Such as, the mechanisms of especially those migrant workers working in public safety regulatory are inadequate; there cities, to get a job has been very lucky, not to are little good communication among the mention whether the job is safe. To some horizontal regulatory mechanism. Secondly, extent, this makes living space for those we still lack a proven crisis response facilities which are undocumented, unlicensed. mechanism, the fragmentation of Crisis In addition, China has not yet reached the Management is serious, our crisis management overall well-off, Social Security is still is still in the reactive phase, we still Lack inadequate. Although state and government specialized agencies system. Furthermore, have been working hard, the survival needs of incentives and punishment mechanism are of those vulnerable groups is still superior to dislocation, performance test system is not security. When minimum survival needs are perfect and so disadvantages, some largely rely on their own safety of life, when government departments will try to cover some people have no choice except risking life problems rather than timely response to when

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they encounter a problem. Thirdly, the Their prevention and solutions often require a government's emergency rescue capability is multifaceted cooperation. If we have temporary Limited now. We must face this reality that leading teams alone rather than an authoritative long-term indifference has led to poorly coordinating body, resource information can’t equipped and lack of information construction. be effectively integrated in a short time once According to statistics, the country's safety and the complex security problems occur. Our emergency rescuing forces are scattered in ability to deal with emergencies will be greatly various departments. The shortage and reduced and the prime time of the disaster dispersion of emergency rescuing human relief will be ultimately bungled. resources, coupled with the lack of disaster Secondly, the allocation of talent is not reduction expertise and disaster prevention enough scientific. While we lack professionals, knowledge results in slow response of the the team of volunteers is inadequate. In recent emergency rescue. years, the complexity of the public safety In the subjective aspect, there is events is significantly enhanced and put government's deliberate omission. It manifests forward higher requirements for the quality of in the following points: first of all, government personnel.” However, most of employer’s departments lack sense of responsibility and employment mechanism is still 'able to enter crisis. Their understanding of new crisis’s root but not leave out', and this lead to the fact that is insufficient, so they are still passive in professionals can’t get in while the surplus disaster management. Secondly, the collusion staff can’t be wed out. The number of between business and officers also contributes workers is big but the efficiency is not high.” [7] to security incidents. Some government At the same time, volunteer team building is officials, driven by the interests, are at the not enough. Once the incident occurs, the more stake of some business and become the high-quality social forces can not be gathered umbrella of security incidents. All these result in a short period of time. In addition, due to the in one-sided pursuit of economic efficiency Basic Law of disaster prevention is not perfect, and large number of potential accidents. we can not ensure the implementation of urban Thirdly, the funding for public safety is disaster prevention and mitigation planning. relatively lack, while the implementation and 2.5. Cultural awareness improvement of public security crisis management mechanism largely depend on it. Not being psychologically prepared for a As far as the city, concentrated to deal with a serious of emergencies is a kind of incentive to few unexpected events should be no problem public safety issues. When SARS spred in with the current city government's financial 2003, many people snapped food in ability. However, due to lack of funds source supermarket, and this phenomenon bring about and assurance shortage, the financial a great deal of waste of resources. The root constraints have been the "bottleneck" to cause of so negative influence of SARS is improve China's public security crisis shortage of social crisis knowledge. So, management mechanism. “Data shows that, strengthening people’s sense of crisis is an between1997and1998, the average ratio of important aspect can not be ignored. public health financial expenditure was 1.26% Secondly, terrorism, ethnic separatism and in low-income countries, while middle-income economic globalization bring new problems to countries 2.25%, China Only 0.62%.” [6] China's public security. The global 2.4.Technological actors interdependence is deepening in context of world economic integration. The usage of We do not have a permanent, authoritative external resources to develop economy brings public safety handle coordinating management new challenges to public safety. As a whole, structure. It is obviously impossible to there are still various contradictions under the complete the huge responsibility to protect the theme of peace and development. Such as country rely on a few departments. But the fact terrorist attacks, Local war, financial crisis, is that we do not have an authoritative competition for resources, the spread of coordinating body. In most cases, our transnational major outbreaks and so on, there anti-disaster system is still sub-sectors. are more and more non-traditional security However, a variety of public safety events are issues. A wide range of highly infectious with the characteristics of the mass and chain. disease, such as AIDS, Mad Cow Disease,

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Dengue fever, SARS and Avian influenza, and organizational security; establish a public seriously interfere with the lives of people safety incentive and restraint mechanisms to around the world. Worldwide terrorist forces speed up legislation on public safety. Fully are on the rise, and the spread is developing. mobilize all social forces, unite all can be Under the influence of worldwide ethnic united, utilize all available resources to conflicts, regional conflicts, religious conflicts minimize the threat to public security. and sharp cultural values conflicts, there have been ethnic separatism, terrorism and terrorist References activities in some regions of China. The wantonly separatist’s activities of East [1] ZhangQiang, “Discussion of public safety Turkistan and Tibetan separatist’s vandalism and security-building mechanisms”, events on 3.14 of 2008, whose reckless International Technical and Economic behavior is under the support of the ethnic Research, pp. 14~15, 2004. separatist forces from worldwide. All these [2] http://www.gov.cn/wszb/zhibo191/content constitute a great threat to China's public _855499.htm security. [3] Tan Qinglian. “Raise the comprehensive capacity of disaster reduction to protect the 3. Conclusions city public safety”, China Civil Engineering Journal, p.105, 2005. Public safety is not an fixed abstract concept, [4] Yang Ping, and Huang Hua. “Ensure public its meaning changing with the historical safety to build a harmonious society”, The changes in the environment. Public safety Nanning Municipal Party School Journal, problems can not be accomplished overnight, pp. 26~27, 2005. nor can once and for all. So, we must adhere to [5] Zhu Dunjun, “Causes and countermeasures the scientific development concept to guide the of the rural public safety risk”, Jiangxi overall work of public safety, fully estimate the Institute of Education (Social Sciences), safe development’s long-term, arduousness and p.17, 2008. complexity, strengthen sense of crisis and [6] Pan Jiajun, and Zhang Xiaodan, “Defect sense of responsibility. Adhere to the "safety and reconstruction of the transition period first, comprehensive treatment approach; both of China's urban public security system”, do a good job with the emergency, but also Social scientists, p. 45, 2004. focus on p prevention of accidents; to attach [7] Zhang Chuanyou, “Strengthening the importance to science and technology while management thinking of China's public also ensure public safety management system security”, Yangtze Forum, pp. 43~44, 2007.

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