Disaster Management and Social Work

Social work is a dynamic profession that deals with diverse situations and problems that affect humanity. The problems and situations that social workers deal with vary in terms of type, magnitude, and intensity. These problems include disasters of varying form and complexity. Disasters worldwide cause mass destruction to infrastructure, loss of human lives, economic downturn, and environmental degradation. They comprise mainly drought, floods, wildfires, animal diseases, earthquakes and tremors, pest infestations, epidemics, and HIV and AIDS. As the number of natural disasters are augmented by the manmade disasters, so is the need of relief work connected to the disasters. In addition to the Government disaster preparedness, there is an enormous role of social work and assistance in disaster mitigation and management. A number of factors come in accord during and after disaster management, the most important of which is providing health care and medicinal support, but equally important are communication establishment, community organization, acquiring and distribution of knowledge, fundraising, panic management, and strategic use of available funds and man power to decrease the sufferings of the effected human population. It is possibility that the local and international NGOs in the catastrophic situations help and participate in the crisis management to such an extent that they can change opinion of policy making and decision making government officials. This book deals with the studies of role of social work in widening the net of government aide in disaster preparedness during and after a catastrophe. Social work education should equip practitioners to undertake an analysis of hazards and determine the likely consequence for individuals, groups, and communities. Disaster risk management makes predictions about disaster occurrences based on the historical experiences of communities. Therefore, disaster risk management is topical to social work education and practice. It is necessary to develop knowledge, strategies, approaches, and methodologies which are fundamental to building community resilience to disasters. The interface between social work education and disaster risk management is inevitable and there is an urgent need for action. Social workers in academia and practice have to define the parameters of practice to operationalize their influence in this field. Social workers are key players in the socio-economic development of their communities worldwide and this should have knowledge related to disaster risk reduction. Disasters by their nature grossly affect the social functioning of individuals, families, groups, and communities worldwide and are therefore a concern for social work. Disaster is usually associated with human suffering caused by natural events such as tsunamis, hurricanes, earthquakes, and floods while human created disasters stem from war, the use of sanctions, the conduct of repressive regimes, and economic and social policies.