Communication and Information Technology

Lack of success in disaster recovery occurs for many reasons, with one predominant catalyst for catastrophic failure being flawed and inefficient communication systems. Increased occurrences of devastating environmental hazards and human-caused disasters will continue to promulgate throughout the United States and around the globe as a result of the continuous intensive urbanization forcing human population into more concentrated and interconnected societies.

Catastrophic disasters like earthquake and flood cause widespread destruction and financial devastation. This has brought disaster management into limelight making it a burgeoning academic research field. The remarkable rise of ICT (Information and Communication Technology) has instigated the scientific world to incorporate these technologies in disaster management. This study presents scientometric analysis to identify the status quo of research on the management of various disasters and role of ICT in it.

New information and communication technologies (ICT) have enabled communities to collect and share information and tap into a network of peers in unprecedented ways. For more than a decade, information has been recognized as a vital part of disaster relief, and recently ICTs have been described to improve the resilience of disaster-ridden societies. At the same time, the humanitarian turn towards technology also entails increasing remote management and centralization.

Although various scholars have researched issues regarding disaster management, few have studied the sharing and coordinating of information during disasters. Not much empirical data is available in this field and there is sparse insight into the factors that may impede or facilitate information sharing and coordination among stakeholders. In this paper, we provide an overview of the relevant obstacles and challenges by examining existing literature and then investigating a series of multi-agency disaster management exercises, using observations and a survey.

Recently ICT has been improved rapidly, and it is likely to make a contribution to effective disaster response. However, ICT is not utilized effectively in disaster response because the environment for ICT management is not considered enough. In this paper, we retrieve lessons learned from actual response at the past disasters in Japan, and introduce them following disaster response process model based on human psychological manner.