Community Engagement in Post-Disaster Recovery

Community Engagement in Post-Disaster Recovery reflects a wide array of practical experiences in working with disaster-affected communities internationally. It demonstrates that widely held assumptions about the benefits of community consultation and engagement in disaster recovery work need to be examined more critically because poorly conceived and hastily implemented community engagement strategies have sometimes exacerbated divisions within affected communities and/or resulted in ineffective use of aid funding. It is equally demonstrated that well-crafted, creative and thoughtful programming is possible.

The wide collection of case studies of practical experience from around the world is presented to help establish ways of working with communities experiencing great challenges. The book offers practical suggestions on how to give more substance to the rhetoric of community consultation and engagement in these areas of work. It suggests the need to work with a dynamic understanding of community formation that is particularly relevant when people experience unforeseen challenges and traumatic experiences. This title interrogates the concept of community through an extensive review of the literature and explores the ways of working with communities in transition and particularly in their recovery phases through an array of case studies in a range of socioeconomic and political contexts.

Focused on the concept of community in post-disaster recovery solutions―an aspect which has received little critical interrogation in the literature―this book will be a valuable resource to students and scholars in disaster management as well as humanitarian agencies.

Graham Marsh is a Visiting Research Fellow in Disaster Management at the School of Energy, Construction and Environment, Faculty of Engineering, Environment and Computing at Coventry University, UK.

Iftekhar Ahmed is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Architecture and Built Environment, University of Newcastle, Australia.

Martin Mulligan is an Associate Professor in the Sustainability and Urban Planning section of the School of Global, Urban and Social Studies at RMIT University and a former Director of RMIT’s Globalism Research Centre, Australia.

Jenny Donovan is the Principal of Melbourne-based urban design practice Inclusive Design, Australia.

Steve Barton is a humanitarian training facilitator and freelance consultant working for agencies such as the Red Cross and the UN and is also founder and director of the Recovery Resource Centre.