Science of Societal Safety: Living at Times of Risks and Disasters (Trust) (in English)
Synopsis "Science of Societal Safety: Living at Times of Risks and Disasters (Trust) (in English)"
This open access book covers comprehensive but fundamental principles and concepts of disaster and accident prevention and mitigation, countermeasures, and recovery from disasters or accidents including treatment and care of the victims. The principal features are, in reality, consistent throughout disasters and accidents despite the terminology. Safety and security problems in our society involve not only engineering but also social, legal, economic, cultural, and psychological issues. The enhancement needed for societal safety includes comprehensive activities of all aspects from precaution to recovery, not only of people but also of governments. In this context, the authors, members of the Faculty of Societal Safety Science, Kansai University, conducted many discussions and reached a common understanding on almost all aspects of disasters and accidents. That achievement was mainly a result of the valuable experience gained in Japan in often-occurring natural disasters such as the Great Hanshin-Awaji earthquake, the Great East Japan earthquake, the train derailment by JR West, and the aviation accident at Osutakayama. Reviewing these disasters and accidents, the authors concluded that the major strategy is, as described above, consistent and independent based on the type and magnitude of disaster or accident, which is also the principle of the foundation of our faculty at Kansai University. The topics treated in this book are rather widely distributed but are well organized sequentially to provide a clear understanding of the principles of societal safety. In the first part there is discussion of the fundamental concepts of safety, the history of Japanese society, and risk factors hidden in present-day society. In the second part, risks involved in the societal and natural environment are dealt with, reviewing past natural disasters, man-made disasters, environmental risks, wars, terrorism, and other crimes. Then follows, in the third part, a description of the quantitative estimation of risk and its assessment and management. The discussion is naturally extended to crisis management by government and businesses. The fourth part of the book is devoted to disaster prevention, mitigation, and recovery systems on the part of the government. The final, fifth part presents a future perspective of societal safety science. Thorough reading of this introductory volume of societal safety science provides a clear image of the issues, with suggested strategies against the critical situations that arise in the modern world, both in highly developed and developing countries. This is largely because, as mentioned above, we have suffered often from natural disasters and have not only gained much valuable information about disasters but also have accumulated a store of experience surrounding those disasters. We are still in the process of reconstruction from the Great East Japan earthquake and the Fukushima nuclear power plant accident, having had both successes and failures. This book is especially valuable therefore in studying the safety and security of people and their societies.
