Miscelaneous Sources of useful information and perspectives

Sources of relevant information, where I often add my spin on what they are saying

• Active Learning Network for Accountability and Performance in Humanitarian Action (ALNAP) has lessons learned from past disasters, which for the most part were for nations very different than the situation in Japan.[1]

o       Japan is the world's third largest economy, and has at its disposable immense resources for response and recovery.

o       Japan is one of the most advanced nations when it comes to dealing with earthquakes, and they have excellent state capacity to respond, and has not appealed for international assistance.

o       The Japanese Red Cross alone has already mobilized (as of March 18) over 100 response teams, and in total has over two million trained volunteers in the country.

•  
  
  • Victims in other nations generally suffered from chronic poverty before the disaster struck.
  • While there is still a fundamental difference in the ability of rich and poor countries to deal with disasters (think Japan vs. Haiti), the distinction is becoming increasing blurred in the middle.
  • Some of the humanitarian community THINKS the public increasingly looks to humanitarian agencies to provide leadership and action during times of uncertainty and crisis, but when NGOs let us down, shouldn’t we go to our national governments to demand accountability in organizations operating within our nations?
• Brookings Institution compares Japan to Haiti, showing what a difference it makes when Japan has a great government able to respond, while Haiti had no government.[2]  But Tokyo was not destroyed.  Would Japan have been able to do as good a job had the disaster wiped out their capital city?
• Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS)
• Council on Foreign Relations
• International Relations and Security Network (ISN)
• The World Bank Group