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Vulnerability of community businesses to environmental disasters
Author(s) -
Zhang Yang,
Lindell Michael K.,
Prater Carla S.
Publication year - 2009
Publication title -
disasters
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.744
H-Index - 70
eISSN - 1467-7717
pISSN - 0361-3666
DOI - 10.1111/j.1467-7717.2008.01061.x
Subject(s) - vulnerability (computing) , natural disaster , disaster research , government (linguistics) , business , vulnerability assessment , environmental planning , emergency management , poison control , environmental resource management , public relations , economic growth , computer security , environmental health , political science , geography , economics , computer science , psychology , management , medicine , linguistics , philosophy , psychological resilience , meteorology , psychotherapist
Business plays important roles in community functioning. 2 However, disaster research has been disproportionately focused on units of analysis such as families, households and government agencies. This paper synthesises the major findings within the business development research field and the disaster research field. It constructs a framework for evaluating business vulnerability to natural disasters. Our theoretical integration of the research conducted to date addresses five major issues. First, it defines the ways in which businesses are subject to the impacts of natural disasters. Second, it identifies the factors that determine the magnitude of business impacts after a disaster. Third, it identifies how and when businesses return to their pre‐disaster level in the disaster stricken community. Fourth, it describes measures that can be taken by individual firms and community planners to reduce the impacts of environmental disasters. Fifth, it identifies needs for public policy and future research to reduce business vulnerability to environmental disasters.