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The devastating earthquake that struck the City of Kobe on 17 January, 1995, created many critical issues for the government of Japan. The Kobe shock pointedly revealed that both the central and local governments had neglected to develop the administrative skills necessary for managing major disasters. This paper, first, provides brief background information on the Kobe disaster. It is followed by a discussion of the problems of the Self-Defense Forces and its involvement in Japan’s crisis management. The paper then describes the function of executives at a time of crisis. In the final section, the paper outlines subsequent government efforts to improve the quality of crisis control in Japan. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper reflects on African conflicts as compound disasters. A compound disaster is defined as an emergency situation with adverse consequences resulting from different, but related, disaster-agents (ICLA, 1996). In a natural disaster situation, for instance, an earthquake that is quickly followed by a fire outbreak, gas leakage, the disruption of water supply and the outbreak of water-borne diseases, would be regarded as a compound disaster. Similarly, armed conflicts trigger a chain of consequences. The focus of this paper is the complexity of the consequences and impact of conflicts in Africa. To a lesser extent, the paper looks at the complex causes of the conflicts themselves and, finally, examines challenges with regard to responses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A magnitude 7.2 earthquake hit one of the major metropolitan areas of Japan at 5:46 am on 17 January 1995. This paper examines the behaviour of public organizations during this event in four municipal governments. Opening and managing shelters, reception of relief goods and cooperation with volunteers are, especially, studied in detail. Some of the programmes implemented by the national government and Hyogo prefectural government are also studied. Based on these studies, characteristics of the organizations' responses during the emergency are analyzed. It is argued that the structure of organizations or the disaster response programmes are formulated or changed by using more stable structures or procedures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Northridge earthquake of 17 January 1994, killed 57 people and injured an estimated 10,000 persons. The earthquake is the most costly disaster in U.S. history, in terms of dollar loss; costs continue to rise as more damage is uncovered, repairs are made, and disaster-related claims are paid out. Recently-issued government estimates place the losses due to direct earthquake damage at approximately $25 billion (Governor's Office of Emergency Services and Federal Emergency Management Agency, 1996), and researchers who are tracking Northridge-related losses believe ‘it is quite possible that total losses, excluding indirect effects, could reach as much as $40 billion’ (Eguchi, et al, 1996) The number of households and businesses that were affected by the earthquake far exceeded the size of the victim population in other recent major disasters in the U.S., including Hurricane Hugo in 1989 and Hurricane Andrew in 1992, and the assistance effort that was launched was the largest ever undertaken for a U.S. disaster. By the end of 1995, 681,710 applications for state and federal assistance had been received, which was more than double the amount filed for any other single disaster event (Governer's Office of Emergency Services and Federal Emergency Management Agency, 1996). Applications for the housing assistance programs operated by the Federal Emergency Management Agency totalled well over half a million, and nearly 200,000 households applied to the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA) for loans to rebuild or repair their homes. Additionally, approximately 39,000 businesses applied to the Small Business Administration for disaster loans (EQE International, 1995). This paper focuses on the immediate and longer-term impacts the earthquake had on businesses in the Greater Los Angeles region. The data reported here are based on a survey that the Disaster Research Center, at the University of Delaware, conducted with a representative,... [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]