Imperatives of disaster research in Bangladesh

Mohammad Tareq Hasan Bangladesh is a disaster prone country. Natural calamities like cyclone, tornado, tidal surge, riverbank erosion, flood and drought are very frequent here. The natural climatic events cause human sufferings and create human conditionalties that the victims cannot alleviate without assistance. The intensity and frequency of these natural climatic disasters have increased due to global climate change impacts. For example: super cyclone "Sidr" (2007), "Nargis" (2008) and "Aila" (2009) ravaged the coastal belt of Bangladesh in successive years and severely affected the life and livelihood of the people. Furthermore, in Bangladesh, 80 per cent of the land is flood plain, thus, remain prone to flooding at least during monsoon. The possible sea level rise as a result of global warming will affect ecosystems, human habitats and livelihoods of millions of people particularly across the coastal region. The frequent occurrences of intensified disasters adversely affect the country's economy and deter its development. The spatial effects of all the disasters vary across the country. Therefore, it is of great importance to carry out place-specific analysis. It is believed that understanding the dynamic interaction between nature and society requires case studies situated in particular places, cultures and context. Gender aspects of disaster are also areas of concern, especially in countries like Bangladesh where religious values and social norms allegedly restrict women's mobility. Thus, research focusing on preparedness for the disasters, along with effective prevention, coping with pre, during and post disaster period and mitigation measures, is imperative for sustainable development of the country. Albeit disasters bring disruptions in normal livelihood activities and social life, create chaos, destroy social structure and contribute to replace social orders. Research on disaster is scanty in Bangladesh. However, the indicative findings have revealed that people's behaviour, i.e., perception; attitudes, beliefs, values, personalities, and response (autonomous, spontaneous and structural adjustment) to disasters vary across the country depending on types of natural disasters such as, famine, river bank erosion, floods or cyclones. In the context of Bangladesh where traditional social structure of inequality pushes poor and minorities into the most fragile and high-risk area, peoples' perception and views and how people perceive alternative opportunities available in coping with disastrous events vary among people of different socio-economic class. It has also been identified that as women bore the social burden of shame when living with others (in shelter homes) during disaster periods, they face difficulties in maintaining purdah during disasters like flood and cyclones. Furthermore, due to a range of socio-economic activities and household responsibility of caring, maintaining and socialising children, rearing livestock, collection and cooking of foods and restricted mobility outside homestead along with less decision making power, women remain more vulnerable during disasters compared to males. Traditional long dress (saree) and long hair also increase women's vulnerability during disaster periods and causality is generally higher among women. It is also been revealed that though disaster affects both women and men the burden of coping with disasters falls heavily on women. It has been argued that poor rural women have very few options for sustaining the family while men in rural areas lose their place of work, especially during floods. Therefore, despite limited options for overcoming the problems, women's responsibility in disaster management is not simple. In spite of being a disaster prone country, it is ironic that so little research has been conducted addressing the varied perception, survival strategies of people facing disasters and differential impacts of these aggravating disasters. The existing literature mostly deals with physical phenomena of disasters, i.e., cause, effect and management of disasters ignoring coping strategies. Moreover, to adapt with and also to deal with disastrous situation priority is to be given on raising awareness of mass people. To face situations of mass emergencies stakeholders from different levels such as: community people, law enforcing authority, policy makers are needed to be made aware of the possible consequences and potential survival and coping strategies to manage as well as to support the survivors. Considering the aforementioned context of disaster in Bangladesh, research is pertinent to identify and grasp the issues relating to disasters, such as: perception, preparing for potential crisis situation at pre disaster period, facing the crisis moment during disaster, coping with the wounds and losses at post disaster phases. Furthermore, gender based differential impact of disasters could be another focal point of disaster, along with a focus on especially vulnerable groups, such as: women, children and minority ethnic groups. To address issues of vulnerabilities only research or planning will bring no good and when planning is done based on empirical research it will do little good if an integrated comprehensive disaster management system is not developed. Moreover, no plan would prove to be successful if effective execution is not sponsored by participation of the mass people. Understanding the importance of mass participation in disaster management researchers has long been emphasising participation of the local people in disaster management, planning, and implementation process. Consequently, the term 'participation' or 'people's participation' has become very popular among many organisations, both governmental and non governmental. It has become a blanket term to validate programmes and also to get funds from donor agencies. Similarly, donor agencies are also interested to provide funds to programmes that focus and aim to ensure people's participation. However, it has proven very difficult to ensure people's participation when local politics and social and political construction of knowledge were not properly taken in understanding. As it has been experienced in Bangladesh, there are different areas of concern in disaster research such as perception, planning, warning, evacuation, emergency, restoration and reconstruction. Furthermore, to mitigate the possible disaster impacts and also to be better prepared to response and recover disaster events or in other words to adapt with the aggravating situation people must adapt with the changing world and for the same peoples' involvement must be ensured considering spatial, geo-climatic, economic conditions, power structure and socio-cultural values. However, many theoretical as well as empirical studies have clearly shown that the success of development programmes largely depends on the active involvement of the common people, that is, beneficiaries rather than on the availability of technology, inputs, credits, etc. In this regard, it is a prerequisite to identify the cultural factors such as: resistance to change, marginalisation, dependence, oppression and culture of silence to voice out that impede participation of local people in disaster management. Other obstacles include: inherent weakness of most rural people- their fears of opposition and their weariness to outside cajoling to get involved. Apart from socio-cultural hindrances, operational obstacles such as: over-centralised planning, inadequate delivery mechanisms, lack of local coordination, inappropriateness of technology, irrelevant project content, and lack of local structures; and structural obstacles are also to be addressed to develop an effective disaster management system and also to engage people in disaster management practices. The writer is an anthropologist and can be reached at email: tareqhasan99@yahoo.com