Emergency Management Impacts

In the provided PrepTalk, David Kaufman explores the diverse pathways to the success of emergency managers as contemporary society depicts constant change and growth. Kaufman details various trends that characterize the modern management environment. First, there is an increase in the aging population. For example, an estimated 16% of the US population is over 65, and approximately 22% of the US population will be over 65 (about 32 million Americans) (FEMA, 2019). Furthermore, the US infrastructure is aging and concentrated in disaster-prone areas. In addition, disasters have been impacted by an acceleration trend through global warming and climate change. Consequently, there is an increase in water and food scarcity, instability, and more effects of extreme weather events. Besides, the rise of cities presents a profound disaster planning challenge to disaster managers. For example, in the 1950s, one-third of the world's population lived in cities (FEMA, 2019). However, by 2050, an estimated two-thirds of the world's population is projected to be living in cities (FEMA, 2019). Therefore, these key trends pose significant disaster management implications that disaster management managers should explore with caution to save lives, mitigate losses during disasters, and prevent future disasters. In the PrepTalk,  David Kaufman identifies three key implications of these trends on emergency management.

First, disaster impacts will continue to rise. Due to the aforementioned trends, disasters around the globe are projected to register a significant decline, mandating the design of effective disaster management strategies. Kaufman states that since 1980, over 250 billion-dollar-plus disasters have occurred, with a cumulative economic loss of approximately 1.7 trillion dollars in the United States (FEMA, 2019). Therefore, this indicates that the number of disasters shall not only increase in count but also increase in size. This means that there shall be more and bigger disasters associated with high mortalities, disabilities, and economic loss (uninsured loss). Kaufman asserts that uninsured loss is the core driver of macroeconomic loss emergencies and disasters. Therefore, governments and other relevant bodies should explore the issue of the increasing aging population, the rise of the urban population, and global warming for effective emergency management planning. For example, the older population requires additional considerations during emergencies. Such considerations include more medical needs, effective evacuation, and social isolation. Thus, disaster response planning should incorporate the trends mentioned above to realize a higher efficacy in saving lives and mitigating economic losses.

Besides that, Kaufman states that there is a growing impact of social movements in disaster response. Traditionally, the disaster response role had been reserved for governments, having the duty to protect the lives of their citizens. However, in contemporary disaster management and response, social movements have shown a growing role in responding to disasters. Today, there is no disaster that is devoid of a large-scale mobilization characterized by collective action from the public. For example, during the 2010-11 Brisbane floods in Australia, the Mud Army social group mobilized over 60000 volunteers in response to the floods (FEMA, 2019). Similarly, during the 2017 Hurricane Harvey in Texas, the US, thousands of lives were saved by public volunteers on personal boats. Thus, these trends show an increasing involvement of community collectivism in disaster response. Thus, there is a significant need to ensure confidence that the public will respond and act in an organized manner in their disaster response. In this regard, there is a need to change the current planning frameworks to incorporate a public collaborative approach to address the complexity and operational reality of the role of social movements in disaster response. An effective collaborative approach between governments and the public in disaster response shall ensure a reduced complexity and more predictability of social movements in disaster management activities.

Lastly, Kaufman argues that contemporary global trends have seen strategic capacity often existing outside governments. As aforementioned, governments have been the core agents in disaster response due to their mandate of protecting their citizens. However, the current key trends have seen strategic capacity shifting from the government to the private sector. In this regard, the private sector’s capacity to deliver commodities in large quantities in disaster-hit areas has profoundly exceeded the government's. This disaster management impact shows the significance of the private sector in disaster management around the globe.

Thus, governments need to incorporate the private sector as a critical element of disaster response. Implementing such a collaborative approach is critical to optimizing the benefits of the private sector’s strategic capacity, enabling the co-creation of shared outcomes that limit lives lost and mitigate economic costs associated with disasters. However, with the depicted significance of social movements in disaster response, governments should ensure an integration of the public and the private sector in pursuing disaster objective goals. From Kaufman, it is evident that effective disaster management is not a single entity's duty but a collaborative mechanism driven by inputs from diverse stakeholders. Thus, a shared goal among these entities is critical to productive emergency management.