Preventing and Managing Large-Scale Disasters in Swiss Cities (original) (raw)

International Civil Protection: Adapting to new challenges

Risk and Resilience Report, 2016

This report compares and contrasts national approaches to addressing three important challenges to modern civil protection: the interdependency of modern threats/risks; austerity and the need for economic efficiency; and the changing nature of communication. Each challenge is examined in the context of an organizational response, and explored from the perspective of two countries where the challenge has been institutionally recognized. The work identified three principle results from these national comparisons of approaches to key challenges: there are no ‘best’ practices high-impact events drive system adaptations; system adaptations coincide with political and economic windows of opportunity.

Preparing for Disasters in Global Cities: An International Comparison

This research report aims to illustrate current trends in research and practice concerning the management of disasters in cities around the world. The report particularly focuses on understanding cities’ contemporary approaches to risk management, exploring aspects of disaster preparedness and risk assessment, response and countermeasures, and the institutions and collaboration involved in current processes of disaster risk management. Beside this analysis of the status quo in cities in different world regions, it draws on a strong examination of the trends in disaster research to also explore how new approaches to risk management are developing or evolving and what cues are triggering change in practice at the city level. Commissioned by the Federal Office for Civil Protection (FOCP) the Center for Security Studies (CSS) the ETH Zurich carried out a research project to illustrate current trends in research and practice concerning the management of disasters in cities around the world. Tim Prior and Florian Roth particularly focuse on understanding cities’ contemporary approaches to risk management, exploring aspects of disaster preparedness and risk assessment, response and countermeasures, and the institutions and collaboration involved in current processes of disaster risk management.

Preparing for Disasters in Global Cities

Risk and Resilience Report, 2013

This research report aims to illustrate current trends in research and practice concerning the management of disasters in cities around the world. The report particularly focuses on understanding cities’ contemporary approaches to risk management, exploring aspects of disaster preparedness and risk assessment, response and countermeasures, and the institutions and collaboration involved in current processes of disaster risk management. Beside this analysis of the status quo in cities in different world regions, it draws on a strong examination of the trends in disaster research to also explore how new approaches to risk management are developing or evolving and what cues are triggering change in practice at the city level. Commissioned by the Federal Office for Civil Protection (FOCP) the Center for Security Studies (CSS) the ETH Zurich carried out a research project to illustrate current trends in research and practice concerning the management of disasters in cities around the world. Tim Prior and Florian Roth particularly focuse on understanding cities’ contemporary approaches to risk management, exploring aspects of disaster preparedness and risk assessment, response and countermeasures, and the institutions and collaboration involved in current processes of disaster risk management.

Learning from Disaster Events and Exercises in Civil Protection Organizations

This report focuses on understanding how civil protection organizations learn from direct or indirect experiences(events), and planned learning processes (exercises). The work is based on information gained from desktop analysis and interviews with civil protection representatives or researchers from the case study countries concerning international events and exercises. We examined how these events were reported, evaluated, and then (if at all) acted on organizationally, and how the information was used to inform adaptive processes in the context of the national civil protection system. An implicit assumption of the authors was that civil protection organizations should be learning organizations that document and respond to operational, coordination, and planning issues if and when they are recognized. By exploring a range of international cases, this study seeks to provide recommendations on good practice, reporting and evaluation, and provide insights into how international civil protection organizations have responded to challenging events or informative exercises.

The Urbanization of Disaster Management

2017

Protection against catastrophic events, including acts of terrorism, is a central task in security policy. Civil protection is an important instrument in this context. In most countries, civil protection is organized through national and regional structures. As a result of the growing importance of urban security issues, the existing systems are coming under pressure to adapt.

Individual Disaster Preparedness: Explaining disaster-related information seeking and preparedness behavior in Switzerland

Risk and Resilience Reports, 2019

Switzerland’s contemporary threat and risk landscape has changed in recent years. Indeed, the risks that now draw the attention of experts and policymakers now include cyber-attacks, pandemics, terrorist attacks and blackouts. But which risks do the Swiss public perceive as the most worrisome? How does risk perception differ between experts and members of the general population? Are risks perceived differently depending on whether they are natural, social or technical in origin? And what are the information needs of the Swiss public with regard to these threats? This CSS Risk and Resilience Report addresses these questions and more.

Factsheet: Social Vulnerability to Disasters

The impact of disasters – understood as extreme events that cause great damage, destruction, and human suffering – is not the same on all people. Disaster losses are only at first sight the result of the respective events. At second sight, they are reflections of human vulnerabilities that arise from physical, social, economic, and political conditions and inequalities that have little to do with the event itself. The concept of social vulnerability to disasters highlights these differences in disaster risk. This factsheet serves three main purposes: First, it offers a brief overview of the concept's meaning and of the central topics currently discussed in both research and policy. Second, it demonstrates the important link between social vulnerability and more established concepts such as risk and resilience, and shows the added value of a social vulnerability perspective in all phases of the disaster/risk management cycle. Finally, it aims to encourage a discussion on social vulnerability in Switzerland, since such a debate is de facto absent to date. It offers a number of practical recommendations on how a social vulnerability perspective can complement ongoing initiatives and processes in risk assessment and disaster management.

Social Vulnerability in Affluent Contexts: An in-depth analysis of social vulnerability in Zürich

Risk and Resilience Reports, 2018

This report develops a comprehensive view of the specific social situation in Zürich, and of the potentially important dynamics that could have an influence on social vulnerability in the city. To better understand social vulnerability in Zürich, CSS’s research team conducted interviews with experts working with very different social groups in the city of Zürich on a day-to-day basis. Three hazards were chosen for detailed spatial analysis: chemical accidents, flooding, and heatwave. A first key finding of this project has been the observation that locally specific social vulnerability characteristics can be difficult to represent cartographically. Second, the project demonstrated that while disasters incite extreme impacts, vulnerability in everyday lives translates to vulnerability in the context of a disaster. Last, given society’s dynamism, disaster managers must also adopt adaptive and flexible approaches to understand how societal changes might influence social vulnerability. The results suggest that social vulnerability can most effectively be addressed by a network of various governmental and non-governmental actors.