Presented by Professor Bob Wasson (representing his team)

R.J. Wasson, A. Nautiyal, V. Nautiyal, A. D. Ziegler, J. Gillen, Y.P. Sundriyal, P. Srivastava, N. Rawat .

Abstract

Knowledge is an essential component of Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR), but often does not include a historical understanding of the precursors of disasters that evolve over decades or even centuries. These precursors and their interactions will not be obvious to those who take a shallow time perspective. Deeper historical accounts of the incubation of disasters, the confluence of threats and human vulnerability, can provide explanations that can lead to more effective governance design. This approach is applied to the 2013 hydroclimatic disaster in the Indian State of Uttarakhand, showing, inter alia, that some of the causes of vulnerability can be traced to governance changes about a century ago, meanwhile the threat is a complex entanglement of multiple hazards with occurrences that can be traced back at least a millennium. This and other examples of the study of disaster incubation should motivate applied historians and archaeologists to work in a cross-disciplinary manner with specialists in flood hydrology and geomorphology, human geography, disaster governance, political science, and political economy to aid the development of better disaster governance.