Natural Disasters: Triggers of Political Instability?

The Political Economy of “Natural” Disasters

Natural disasters occur in a political space. Although events beyond our control may trigger a disaster, the level of government preparedness and response greatly determines the extent of suffering incurred by the affected population. We use a political economy model of disaster prevention, supported by case studies, that explains why some governments prepare well for disasters and others do no...

Natural Disasters

political conditions of instability

most theories in social sciences have aspects of causality, but understanding the causes of social phenomena is not possible through statistical correlation tests. to overcome this problem, fuzzy qualitative comparative analysis was developed to identify the cause of social phenomena. having qualitative roots, this method tests the necessary and sufficient causes for the emergence of a social p...

Instability, investment, disasters, and demography: natural disasters and fertility in Italy (1820–1962) and Japan (1671–1965)

This article examines whether natural disasters affect fertility-a topic little explored but of policy importance given relevance to policies regarding disaster insurance, foreign aid, and the environment. The identification strategy uses historic regional data to exploit natural variation within each of two countries: one European country-Italy (1820-1962), and one Asian country-Japan (1671-19...

Epidemics after Natural Disasters

The relationship between natural disasters and communicable diseases is frequently misconstrued. The risk for outbreaks is often presumed to be very high in the chaos that follows natural disasters, a fear likely derived from a perceived association between dead bodies and epidemics. However, the risk factors for outbreaks after disasters are associated primarily with population displacement. T...