Speaker
Description
The relationship between emergency management, emergency planning and spatial planning is undeniable, although differing perspectives on the conceptualization of planning tools and spatial aspects within them make it highly controversial. By its very nature, spatial planning aims at governing changing territories, while emergency planning tends to develop strategies that assume the environment is static, often failing to consider the transformative and evolutionary characterization of regions (March et al, 2018). Emergency planning has a highly operational soul, aimed at maintaining systems in condition of sufficiency in case of disaster events, and, for this reason, is often dismissed by planners for being too dedicated to action, lacking a deeper reflection on the territorial implications of the operational decisions of emergency plans (Menoni, 2013; Bertin, 2018). Likewise, practitioners in charge of emergency management seem not to consider the spatial implications of their operational choices, underestimating the importance of a complex understanding of the territory in risk reduction practices (La Rocca et al., 2020). Moreover, the relationship between spatial planning and emergency planning is further complicated by the complexity of the risk governance network and the overlapping roles, actors, and competencies that characterize both territorial and risk governance (Gaillard and Mercer, 2012).
Based on these considerations, this contribution examines how the role of the spatial component and the governance component are addressed in the drafting of emergency plans within the Italian context.
The work is based on the analysis of a case study, namely the participatory process for the updating of the Civil Protection plan of Bagnara Calabra, a small town in the Calabria Region, in the south of Italy. The analysis of such planning process, which involves the component of community engagement as well, proved to be extremely useful in providing an insight into a complex and bounded system like the one of emergency management and planning, as it helps in the creation of context dependent knowledge (Neuvel and Brink, 2010). The results reported in the text come from the analysis of the planning documents, interviews with relevant actors as well as from the participant observation of the nearly two-year participatory process.
The outcomes of the research provide an interesting perspective on the implementation of emergency planning and on the organization of the risk governance network. The process that interested the case study perfectly reshaped the complex nexus of the risk governance system, especially because the entire range of territorial levels—from national to local—was involved. It emerged that the frequent overlap of competencies can lead to confusion in the division of responsibilities, and that clearly identifying the roles of each actor—both institutional and technical—can help establish effective communication channels that facilitate the exchange of formal and informal knowledge between the parties. As for the use of the emergency planning instrument, it emerged how the presence of the plan along the process was elusive, being considered by technicians and administrators just in its procedural dimension, with a lack of spatial consideration. However, the relevance of spatial issues still emerged thanks to the community, which promptly focused the attention of the discussion on the localization of strategic areas as well as the definition of safe routes. This demonstrated that territorial issues could become fertile ground for initiating dialogue between the parties and facilitate the integration of local and scientific knowledge.
References
Bertin, Mattia (2018), Per esser pronti. Ripensare la gestione dell’emergenza in
città. Franco Angeli, Milano
Gaillard, Jean-Christophe, Mercer Jessica (2012) From knowledge to action: Bridging gaps in disaster risk reduction. Prog Hum Geogr 37, pp. 93–114
La Rocca, Rosa Anna, Palermo, Annunziata, Viapiana Maria Francesca, (2021) Editorial Preface, TeMA Special Issue. 1, p. 3-6
March, A. Nogueira de Moraes, L., Riddell, G., Stanley, J., van Delden, H.,
Beilin, R., Dovers, S., Maier, H. (2018). Practical and Theoretical Issues: Integrating
Urban Planning and Emergency Management – First Report for the Integrated
Urban Planning for Natural Hazard Mitigation Project. Melbourne, Australia:
Bushfire and Natural Hazards CRC
Menoni, Scira (2013), Emergency Planning. In: Bobrowsky, P.T. (eds) Encyclopedia
of Natural Hazards. Encyclopedia of Earth Sciences Series. Springer, Dordrecht
Neuvel, Jeroen, Brink, Andri Van Den (2010). The Consideration of Emergency Management Issues in Spatial Planning Practices. Environment and Planning C: Government and Policy, 28, pp. 37–53
| Keywords | emergency planning; disaster management; risk governance; spatial planning |
|---|---|
| Best Congress Paper Award | Yes |
