Post-disaster recovery: how to encourage the emergency of economic and social dynamics to improve resilience?

¹ Cerema, Laboratoire de Nancy, 54510 Tomblaine, France
² Cerema, Département Villes et Territoires, 44200 Nantes, France
³ Cerema, Département Risques Eau Construction, 13100 Aix-en-Provence, France

^a Corresponding author: gwenael.jouannic@cerema.fr

Abstract

The disaster management cycle is made up of three phases: 1) the prevention during the pre-disaster time 2) the crisis management during the disaster then 3) the post-disaster recovery. Both the “pre-disaster” time and the “crisis” are the most studied phases and tap into the main resources and risk management tools. The post-disaster period is complex, poorly understood, least anticipated, and is characterized by the implication of a wide range of people who have a vested interest. In most cases, the collective will is to recover the initial state, without learning from the disaster. Nevertheless, the post-disaster period could be seen as an opportunity to better reorganize the territory to reduce its vulnerability in anticipation of future flood events. To explore this hypothesis, this work consists in analyzing the post-flood phase from a bibliographical work and the detailed study of 3 disaster areas. These results will lead us to better understand the concept of “recovery” in the post-disaster phase.