GIS and Evidence-Based Policy Making - Chapter 11

11 Spatial Methodologies to Support Postwar Reconstruction Sultan Z. Barakat, Adrijana Car, and Peter J. Halls CONTENTS 11.1 Introduction............................................................................................. 261 11.2 Postwar Reconstruction Process........................................................... 262 11.3 GIS in Postwar Reconstruction............................................................. 266 11.4 Use of Spatial Decision Support Systems in PWR............................ 268 11.5 Public Participation GIS......................................................................... 270 11.6 Deriving Ontology for SDSS for PWR................................................. 273 11.7 Drawing Threads Together: Our Proposed Methodology............... 276 11.8 Conclusions.............................................................................................. 278 References ........................................................................................................... 278 11.1 Introduction The Post-war Reconstruction and Development Unit (PRDU) of the Univer-sity of York has been concerned with practical methodologies for commu-nity reconstruction after conflict for several years. Their work is predicated on experience derived from observation and participation with humanitar-ian aid agencies in the delivery of relief and in the encouraging and enabling of return and reconstruction. This experience, gained from work in a wide variety of theaters of conflict, demonstrates that postwar reconstruction (PWR) is a complex operation concerning individuals, communities, prop-erty, infrastructure, environment, and cultural heritage. It is the experience of the PRDU that an inclusive concept of reconstruction and development, which encompasses the key stages of relief, rehabilitation, and reconstruc-tion leading to sustainability, is the most appropriate. This approach springs from the concept within the delivery of humanitarian aid of do no harm. Do no harm is concerned with the provision of emergency aid, food, cloth-ing, medical care and shelter, and seeks to deliver this without prejudice to 2007 by Taylor & Francis Group, LLC. either the present situation or future reconstruction efforts. Initially con-ceived regarding the protection and emergency repair of cultural heritage, the concept underpins humanitarian aid. Spatial Decision Support Systems (SDSS) ‘‘are explicitly designed to sup-port a decision research process for complex spatial problems’’ (Densham, 1991, p. 403), and there can be few more complex spatial problems than rebuilding communities after war. Current methodologies in reconstruction are based on the creation of inter- and intracommunity focus groups, starting with a planning workshop, during which a serious attempt is made to identify and account for each community component’s needs. These groups are inevitably multidisciplinary, and there are frequent prob-lems relating to the need to interpret the understanding and language of one group of professionals to that of another and to the nonprofessional popu-lace. Participatory planning GIS research appears to offer opportunities— especially where, in the postwar arena, communities remain dispersed owing to unsafe ground conditions or where individual groups of people cannot yet bring themselves to cooperate, face-to-face, with some other group or groups. The additional benefit of the potential to model possible scenarios in order to assess the likely impact and implications would be very valuable in helping to avoid mistakes which can frequently cost human lives. This chapter reports work in progress to apply spatial methodologies for the design and implementation of decision-support systems for application in the task of community reconstruction after war. Although examples are cited from specific experience, we are seeking a general set of principles. 11.2 Postwar Reconstruction Process While the relief effort is precisely that, rehabilitation is concerned with the support of afflicted communities. This includes encouragement and training such as to enable the people to organize themselves, to take control of their situation and environmental context, and to actively participate in the provision and distribution of aid and in the improvement of services, infrastructure, and conditions in general. Reconstruction, the first step on the long-term recovery process, is con-cerned with the physical, the institutional, and the environmental aspects. There will be a need to jump-start the development process that has been interrupted and set back by the disaster. It is our experience that despite the hardship of survival during a protracted conflict, people continue to display a lively spirit of initiative and enterprise. People seek solutions to their immediate needs and an informal economy often operates within and across formal lines of demarcation involving local populace and combatants. Although formal administrative and international support is necessary to achieve large-scale reconstruction, at the local level recovery proceeds 2007 by Taylor & Francis Group, LLC. regardless of politics, international interventions, or formal planning—but is much slower and more painful than might otherwise be the case. Such local activities take advantage of whatever opportunities reductions in the conflict offer. By exploiting this local knowledge and expertise, local gov-ernance and aid agencies can enable the transition from emergency to reconstruction in more stable areas by the provision of incentives and, thus, strengthen moves toward peace. There is a symbiotic relationship between reconstruction and peace building: each is inextricably dependent on the other, and it is the experience of the PRDU that this phase can be an effective agent toward the achievement of peace. Clearly, unless care and a long-term view are taken, it is possible to take action at this stage which will adversely impact the subsequent phase of reconstruction. This final stage may be identified as beginning at the point at which the conflict can be defined as being over but has no discernable conclusion, gradually over time being subsumed into the normal planning activities of a sustainable community. Planning depends upon the availability and access to up-to-date informa-tion and of effective means of communicating this information to all the actors involved. Information is the vital component of all decision-making as is the skill of prioritizing the available information in order to extract that pertinent to the case in point. It is also important that a system exists to maintain this information as and when the conditions change. One com-ponent of this information must be knowledge of the community dynamics, for example, how that community copes with disaster. Barakat and Deely (2001, p. 63) complain that communities’ coping capacities tend to be ignored or underestimated and that there is little research or understanding of this vital community component. We will discuss this issue later. Sparrow (2001) quotes Tenna Mengiste, formerly of the Ethiopian Red Cross, ‘‘relief will save the day, but when people are living on the verge of disaster it isn’t enough to tell them to return to the status quo. If we can raise the quality of life, we may enable the most vulnerable not just to survive but to cope with, and prevent disasters.’’ Sparrow reports that some places prone to natural disasters are becoming lawless and a threat to security, and charts political instability resulting from serious natural disasters from the volcanic eruption of the Aegean island of Thira in 1600 BC through the 464 BC rebellion in Sparta, triggered by an earthquake that left the city in ruins, to events in the present. While it is clearly simplistic to try to blame all conflict on natural occurrences, just as it is to blame despotic leaders, disaster resilience is dependent on sustainable livelihoods since income generation on the part of the populace boosts the chances of peace (Simms, 2001). Simms (2001) outlines what he calls an ecology of disaster recovery. He sees instability, resulting from the currently changing environments of world trade and finance, and climate, such that aid and recovery efforts will increasingly be judged not by how quickly structures are rebuilt, only to be destroyed by the next disaster, but by how reconstruction contributes 2007 by Taylor & Francis Group, LLC. to the long-term resilience of communities (Simms, 2001, p. 35). Citing, by example, the biodiversity of the natural environment and noting that those healthiest parts are also the most diverse, Simms calls for solutions to include community involvement in the design and implementation of reconstruction, more local procurement of resources, and the introduction of new methods of assessment to ensure aid interventions sustain rather than undermine local economies. He notes that diversified local economies are stronger than monocultures and from his observation of the natural environment’s diversity, argues for a diverse economy, built on small-scale enterprises that use resources sustainably and incorporate indigenous knowledge (Simms, 2001, p. 50). Any methodology must therefore be able to interact with the large numbers of local actors who will be involved. For many years, public response to disasters affecting people has been to donate relief aid. Frequently, however, the aid has been delivered with but a poor and superficial prior analysis of what is required in the short term, let alone the requirements for a sustainable future. The way aid is delivered can prove counterproductive and continue to raise disturbing questions about whose needs are being served by aid—those of the donor agencies or their beneficiaries (Sparrow, 2001, p. 13). Sparrow quotes a Khurantatuth schoolteacher who, following receipt of aid after a cyclone had all but destroyed his village, said thoughtfully ‘‘The village was grateful, but a strategy of kum kum (little by little) would have been better. It was more than a family could consume.’’ The quantity of relief delivered in a single operation had been so great that the villagers had not known what to do with it! Sayagues, concerned about the post-aid plight of flood victims in Venezuela, comments that the requirement is to put people at the center of disaster recovery and commitment to ensure that temporary solutions do not become permanent—aid dependency delays recovery (Sayagues, 2001, p. 86). The need is for careful targeting of relief aid in order to provide a secure platform from which those affected by the disaster can begin the slow process of recovery (Sparrow, 2001, p. 15). Strategies and processes for reconstruction after conflict must be relevant to the political, social–relational, and environmental context in which they are to operate. Inappropriate or inadequately flexible processes or strategies can, however, fuel tensions and have the potential to lead to (re)new(ed) conflict (Stiefel, 1999). The period during, and immediately following, active conflict is one of rapid change. As the situation changes, information preciously gathered becomes outdated, people and resources become avail-able, incapacitated, or move. The indicators used to measure local activity, economic, social, cultural, and environmental must be flexible and respon-sive to the changing situation. In addition to receipt of information from the locale, there must be a balancing flow of information back, to encourage and support the local people, or their goodwill, and the information source, will be short lived. In the progress from the anarchy of war to the security of peace people must be able to feel a part of the processes concerning them: participation is essential, not an optional extra. ‘‘Designs cannot simply be 2007 by Taylor & Francis Group, LLC. dropped from one environment to another and often the local workforce have no experience in working with the materials...sustainable change comes from within’’ (Jaquemet, 2001, p. 113). To achieve appropriate and sustainable designs demands close collaboration with the local people, to understand their environment and resources. Sustainability must relate to the availability of resources, human, natural, physical, social, political, and economic. Skills obtained prior to the conflict may not be relevant to reconstruction, indeed may relate to outdated indus-try or industry for which the previous sources of raw materials or markets may no longer be accessible. New skills may need to be acquired. The reconstruction process must focus on the real needs and priorities of the community because they form the primary resource; it is essential that the local communities have a sense of ownership and responsibility toward the reconstruction projects (Barakat and Hoffman, 1995). One prob-lem here is in managing the balance between external aid and the exploit-ation of local resources. Uncontrolled deforestation to yield timber products for rebuilding, for example, could lead to serious environmental problems that may threaten the survival of the community in the future. Care must be taken in the disposal of waste, in the location of new development and the impact of infrastructure reconstruction on natural phenomena, such as river flow and pollution. Hitherto, much of the focus of reconstruction has concerned the physical, urban environment yet harmony with the natural environment is critical for sustainability. In some cases, for example, following previously intensively worked agricultural land remaining fallow for several years may open up opportunities for a change to more sustain-able and organic practices. In addition, movement away from intensive arable practices lessens the danger of groundwater pollution with conse-quent benefits for the urban population dependent upon subsurface water supplies. Barakat and Deely (2001) contend that a rehabilitation methodology is required that is focused on the local populace and directed at enabling the development of a sustainable community. They set out potential conceptual, programming, and structural barriers to the process, which must be identi-fied and evaluated, and recognize that the methodology must need adapt to certain of these barriers, in order to work around them. With each of the barriers enumerated, they outline likely benefits for acknowledging that type of barrier and the dangers of ignoring them—or, particularly in the case of structural barriers, to take account of the limitations of the reconstruction process and so inform progress in spite of that barrier. From this stance, they propose a methodology for community-led rehabili-tation in terms of foundations and steps toward local ownership for sus-tainable recovery. They make the case that investing in rehabilitation can be a means of investing in peace, no matter how far off formal peace may appear. ‘‘The long term recovery of war-torn societies is dependent on increasing people’s confidence in their future both at household and 2007 by Taylor & Francis Group, LLC. ... - tailieumienphi.vn