The Political Costs of Failure in the Katrina and Rita Disasters

Datos Bibliográficos

ID9768388
AutoresWilliam L Waugh (0000-0001-5016-807X, Andrew Young School of Policy Studies at Georgia State University, autor de correspondencia)
Año2006
Volumen604
Número1
Páginas10-25
Fecha de publicación2006-03-01
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessSí
TipoARTICLE
RevistaThe Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 0002-7162 • E-ISSN: 1552-3349
EditorialSAGE Publications (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1177/0002716205284916
OpenAlexW2157008437
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas23
Referencias citadas5

The Katrina and Rita disasters have raised serious questions about the capabilities of the national emergency management system to handle catastrophic disasters. The system is broken and must be repaired before the next major hurricane, earthquake, volcanic eruption, terrorist attack, or pandemic. The poor disaster responses may have serious political costs for those officials who failed to manage the hazards along the Gulf and/or failed to respond adequately to the storms—or simply appeared to be ineffectual in very dire circumstances. There have already been political casualties among the administrators responsible for managing the responses, and there may well be casualties among the politicians when voters go to the polls. The recommendation to give the military a lead responsibility in catastrophic disaster responses has been met with strong opposition; the issue may broaden the rift between governors’ offices and the White House over homeland security and emergency management and broaden the gap between local emergency management imperatives and federal policies

Business · Emergency management · Geography · Homeland security · Hurricane katrina · Natural disaster · Opposition (politics · Political science · Politics · Terrorism · Disaster Management and Resilience · Infrastructure Resilience and Vulnerability Analysis · Law · Military and Defense Studies · Public Administration