Disaster, War, and Drugs: Policy Levers and Rebuilding Communities

• Pages: 43-62
• Published date: 29 October 2012
• Date: 29 October 2012
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1108/S1521-6136(2012)0000017006
• Author: Megan Reid,Alex Bennett,Luther Elliot,Andrew Golub

DISASTER, WAR, AND DRUGS:

POLICY LEVERS AND

REBUILDING COMMUNITIES

Megan Reid, Alex Bennett, Luther Elliot and

Andrew Golub

ABSTRACT

Purpose In this chapter, we expand the definition of disaster through

combining the tenets of disaster studies with the literature on risks and

consequences of war and conflict-related displacement and dislocation,

with a focus on the challenges that drug misuse and changing drug mar-

kets present in these contexts. We conclude with policy recommenda-

tions for successful community rebuilding with relation to drugs and

drug markets following various forms of disaster, gleaned from the com-

bination of these areas of inquiry.

Design/methodology/approach We discuss the concepts of risk,

social vulnerability, and consequences as related to traditional concep-

tualizations of disaster, and highlight how they can also be applied to the

study of veterans returning from war. We focus the on the similarities

related to drugs and drug markets.

Disasters, Hazards and Law

Sociology of Crime, Law and Deviance, Volume 17, 4362

Copyright r2012 by Emerald Group Publishing Limited

All rights of reproduction in any form reserved

ISSN: 1521-6136/doi:10.1108/S1521-6136(2012)0000017006

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Findings Overall, the similar vulnerabilities, potential for trauma, and

drug-related consequences experienced by both disaster survivors and

veterans suggest that the experience of war and return from such an

event could be considered a disaster and analyzed as such.

Originality/value of power Few scholars have examined how to

expand the definition of a disaster and what is examined in the field of

disaster studies. This chapter does this by examining how war could be

analyzed as a disaster. It demonstrates the parallels between war and

traditional disaster.

INTRODUCTION

As the field of disaster studies grows, scholars in many disciplines continue

to discuss the definition of “disaster” (Bolin & Stanford, 1998; Fordham,

1998; Kreps, 1984; Perry & Quarantelli, 2005; Quarantelli, 1998;

Quarantelli & Dynes, 1977). Early disaster researchers conceptualized a

disaster as an event created by the natural environment, but contemporary

disaster researchers recognize that social and man-made factors also con-

tribute to the occurrence of a disaster. The general consensus among those

who study these phenomena is that a disaster is an event that results from

the interface of nature, technology, and social conditions. At this point,

scholars across disciplines agree that disasters are socially constructed 

the result of historical and contemporary socioeconomic factors (Bankoff,

2003; Blaikie, Cannon, Davis, & Wisner, 1994).

This understanding allows for exploring whether and how to expand the

types of events that are classified as disasters. Examining events not before

considered in disaster studies could add theoretical and empirical rigor to

the field; it could also lead to new and innovative public policy responses.

Researchers should critically think about how the concepts of social vul-

nerability and risk play out in everyday life and how the definition of a

disaster could be expanded and/or refined. War and political-economic

transition may fit the definition of a disaster, but they have only recently

been studied through this lens (see, e.g., Friedman, Rossi, and Braine’s

work on “Big Events” 2009) and like traditionally conceived disasters,

both war and rapid political-economic transitions often cause massive dis-

placement, shortages in basic resources (e.g., food and housing), and lack

of basic service delivery and have therefore been conceptualized as “com-

plex emergencies” (Salama, Spiegel, Talley, & Waldman, 2004). Such

44 MEGAN REID ET AL.