THE URBANIZATION OF DISASTERS. THE CASES OF HAITI AND CHILE

Six months after the devastating earthquake of January 12, 2010 parts of Haiti look like the disaster struck yesterday. More than 1.5 million remain in overcrowded displacement camps, living in intolerable conditions. People of Haiti have no house to sleep in, no job, no water, poor nutrition, no money to pay for school, no medical care. The city is destroyed. The scale of the disaster left the world stunned. No one escaped the tragedy. The level of damage and the resulting overwhelming needs are a direct result of poverty, historical context and under-development.
The social and economic situation view from inside did not changed a lot with the earthquake occurrence because population seem to be very resilient to adversities - they had suffered along the centuries and had been helping each other with the limited resources.
Haiti seems the capital of NGO’s, but the NGO’s bureaucracy and the lack of leadership of the Haitian government and corruption prevent Haitians from moving forward in the rebuilding of their country. The recovery process will take decades – perhaps more than a generation.

The disaster of Haiti is not the earthquake. What we are seeing here is what happens when an extreme natural event occurs in the lives of people who are already frighteningly vulnerable.

The earthquake in Chile (February 27, 2010) was far stronger than the one that struck Haiti – the death toll in this latter nation is 3 order of magnitude higher (452 deaths in Chile and 300 000 in Haiti). In terms of homeless however, the differences between the two countries are not so large.
Chile is wealthier and better prepared, with building codes, better emergency response and a long history of handling seismic catastrophes. However, not all structures performed as expected.
No living Haitian had ever experienced an earthquake at home when the January 12 disaster crumbled their poorly constructed buildings.
Many lessons can be learned from either situation, even coming from completely different contexts.

As the world’s population becomes increasingly concentrated in large cities, an intensification of risk is being observed. A disaster-prone urban future should be avoided: we urgently need a “disaster-free” urbanization which can be achieved with good policies and practices in urban development.

Carlos Sousa Oliveira and Mónica Amaral Ferreira