Citation

Zhang H, Zhao Y, Pedersen J. Disasters 2019; ePub(ePub): ePub.

Affiliation

The Fafo Institute for Labour and Social Research.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2019, John Wiley and Sons)

DOI

10.1111/disa.12393

PMID

31334856

Abstract

This paper aims to study the household vulnerability to disaster, based on an asset vulnerability framework for household livelihood. Such frameworks are widely used for analyzing household poverty and focus on household living conditions and well-being, rather than money-metric measures of income and consumption. The conceptualization of household's vulnerability is a challenge in current studies on coping with disasters. The paper considers whether capital asset framework can be useful in identifying and assessing household vulnerability to natural disasters in the context of the 2008 Wenchuan earthquake in China. The household asset vulnerability framework categorizes assets into five measures (human, natural, physical, financial, and social capital), and attempts to measure households' resilience and vulnerability. When used on large-scale disasters, asset-based methods face the difficulty of heterogeneity of the population, for example by livelihood types or residence. Moreover, the effect of external interventions, such as relief aids, must be taken into account. Using data from large-scale living condition and needs assessment surveys carried out after the 2008 Wenchuan Earthquake, the paper will attempt to employ classification methods with capital assets framework to assess households' vulnerability during natural disasters in China. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.

This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.

Language: en

Keywords

Household vulnerability; Wenchuan earthquake; capital assets; disaster assessment