On Risk and Disaster: Lessons from Hurricane Katrina - Softcover

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Ronald J. Daniels is Provost and Professor of Law at the University of Pennsylvania. He has published widely, including Rethinking the Welfare State: The Prospects for Government by Voucher (with Michael Trebilcock) and The Security of Freedom: Essays on Canada's Anti-Terrorism Bill (coedited with Patrick Macklem and Kent Roach). Donald F. Kettl, Professor of Political Science and Director of the Fels Institute of Government at the University of Pennsylvania, has written or edited System under Stress: Homeland Security and American Politics, The Global Public Management Revolution, The Politics of the Administrative Process (with James W. Fesler), The Transformation of Governance: Public Administration for the 21st Century, among many other books. Howard Kunreuther is Professor and Codirector of the Risk Management and Decision Processes Center at the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School. His has written or coedited a number of books, including Catastrophe Modeling: A New Approach to Managing Risk (with Patricia Grossi) and Wharton on Making Decisions (with Stephen Hoch). Amy Gutmann is the eighth President of the University of Pennsylvania and the author of Why Deliberative Democracy? (with Dennis Thompson), Identity in Democracy, Democratic Education, Democracy and Disagreement (with Dennis Thompson), and Color Conscious (with K. Anthony Appiah). Her reviews have appeared in the New York Times, Times Literary Supplement, Washington Post, and other general publications.

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Foreword
Amy Gutmann

"The problems that exist in the world today cannot be solved by the level of thinking that created them."—Albert Einstein

More than four months have passed since Hurricane Katrina struck. We now know that our affluent country failed both to take adequate precautions against the hurricane's deadly impact and to respond effectively to its devastation of New Orleans and other Gulf Coast areas. We do not yet know what lessons will be learned—or heeded—from one of the greatest catastrophes our country has ever experienced.

As the suffering grew ever more alarming in the hurricane's immediate aftermath, we at the University of Pennsylvania rapidly mobilized our community to help survivors rebuild their shattered lives. We invited 100 displaced students to take their fall classes at Penn. And as generous donations poured into relief agencies, students and staff volunteers traveled to the Gulf coast to support efforts on the ground.

At the same time, we began to confront the problems that contributed to making the devastation of Katrina so troubling not only in its breadth and depth but also in its unbalanced effects across different segments of the population. Katrina's aftermath raised perhaps the most profound and disturbing moral question that our society has yet fully to confront: how willing is the United States to compensate for the increased risks to life and health associated with poverty, race, growing economic inequality, inadequate emergency preparedness, and antiquated urban infrastructures? This overarching question cannot be answered by one person thinking alone or by a single institution acting alone.

Nor can the underlying social, economic, and environmental problems that have been magnified by Katrina be solved by the level of institutional thought and action that created them. A shocking amount of shoddy thought and action—from the denial of scientifically manifest risks to the disavowal of morally apparent official responsibility—will need to be transcended to resolve the problems that have victimized hundreds of thousands of Americans.

We must find a way to equitably distribute risks in order to push our democracy closer to its promise of liberty and justice, not only for the affluent but for all. Rising to this challenge demands that the public and private sectors collaborate to develop effective prevention strategies and coordinated responses to natural disasters, industrial accidents, terrorist attacks, and pandemics.

We at the University of Pennsylvania pride ourselves on being one of the world's major research universities. But we cannot rest on our laurels. Institutional contributions to effective prevention and response are a matter not only of technical expertise but also of moral and social responsibility. Collaborating with others, we have the capacity and expertise to develop a framework within which to address such daunting and urgent challenges. We are committed to embracing our civic responsibilities to help inform public debate and discussion.

For all of these reasons, Penn Provost Ron Daniels took the lead in organizing a symposium on Hurricane Katrina in Washington, D.C. on December 1, 2005. The symposium brought together approximately 250 policymakers, public and private-sector leaders, and scholars from many disciplines to raise the level of thinking on risk management issues and develop more effective strategies that can save lives and speed recovery when disaster strikes.

At the core of these discussions were two recurring questions:

• How can—and should—the nation come together to rebuild the storm-ravaged Gulf coast?
  
• What broader lessons does Hurricane Katrina teach about the public and private sectors' role in helping citizens and firms deal with the inevitable large-scale risks we all face in the twenty-first century?

This book represents the first attempts to answer these questions. As this book goes to press, we are already planning a second Katrina conference and town meeting—organized by the Penn Institute on Urban Research—that will build on the analyses and strategies contained in this volume. I am thankful to Provost Daniels and the many eminent scholars and policymakers who are doing their best to bring a higher level of thought and action to bear on the many profound problems of societal response to risk that Hurricane Katrina put into high relief. Our thanks go also to the University of Pennsylvania Press for so quickly bringing the symposium's findings to the attention of a wider public.

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Introduction
Ronald J. Daniels, Donald F. Kettl, and Howard Kunreuther

The 9/11 terrorist attacks made it clear to Americans that we are living in a new world of geopolitical risks. Hurricane Katrina has shown the world how vulnerable the United States is to natural disasters. A widely predicted Category 3 hurricane left more than 1,300 people dead and hundreds of thousands displaced in New Orleans and throughout the southern part of four states. It was the most expensive natural disaster in the history of the United States, but its true cost to the region and the nation cannot be measured in dollars alone. It brought a great city to its knees and focused large questions about the nation's ability to prepare for and respond to natural disasters and other large risks.

While much-needed investigations will highlight specific failures at local, state, and national levels, Katrina raises a set of much deeper questions about how we address risk in our society. Could our current policies and infrastructure be as vulnerable in our complex modern world as the levees that were designed to protect New Orleans? What public and private initiatives will be needed to increase security and mitigate losses in an increasingly insecure and inherently risky world? Who—government, market, or the third sector—is and should be responsible for taking these actions? As a catastrophic failure, Katrina presents an opportunity to look at the entire public-private systems for addressing risks, and perhaps build better ones. As Stanford Professor Paul Romer has said, "a crisis is a terrible thing to waste."

Issues of risk and responsibility for natural disasters are of interest not only to researchers and policy makers but also to those affected directly or indirectly by these tragic events. In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, disaster preparedness and recovery are now at the forefront of the public policy agenda. On the one hand, the devastation of Katrina raises fundamental questions about the strengths and frailties of the existing institutional, legal, and policy landscape governing the risk management of natural disasters in American society. Does the damage inflicted by Katrina imply that the United States is vulnerable to other types of natural hazards that could impose similar, if not greater, damage on its citizens? If so, what types of reforms are required in order to mitigate the risks faced by individual citizens or communities, particularly where there is evidence that these risks are disproportionately borne by the least advantaged members of society?

On the other hand, the avowed determination of the country's political leadership to rebuild the Gulf region raises vexing questions about how to best use public money. Should governments focus on rebuilding adversely affected communities or on providing targeted assistance to adversely affected individuals? This issue of instrument choice is particularly salient because there is no assurance that individuals who receive targeted subsidies will necessarily decide to remain in those communities devastated by Katrina. Politicians who favor assistance to individuals may face onerous political consequences from local interest groups committed to rebuilding...