SUNDAY 1 JULY, 2018 – UWI TODAY
11
GEOGRAPHY
in the region are the products of imperialism.
To display the limitations of mainstream media
accounts of disasters in the Caribbean, Gahman
contended that what is often left often of the discussion
regarding disaster narratives is the centuries-long,
resiliency-eroding colonial extractions of the region’s
resources and wealth, which could have otherwise
been used to fund prevention and protection efforts
for differing communities and ecosystems.
One present-day example he mentioned is how
free trade policies, often including conditionalities of
“adjustment” loans from institutions like the IMF, open
the door for multinational corporations that undercut
local businesses, siphon profits out of the region, and
pollute the region more (most often in areas where
poor communities live). He noted it is then not
uncommon for people whose small businesses “fail”
under this scheme, to later be heavily exploited inside
the new foreign factories and hotels, where workplace
abuse and sexual harassment occur more frequently.
Dr Gahman also detailed how social vulnerability
is sustained and aggravated by state institutions and
government ministries that continue to rely upon
pre-independence administrative hierarchies and the
logics of capitalism.
In linking these dynamics to “natural” disasters,
Dr Gahman showed howwomen are exposed to more
post-event contaminated water than anyone else,
because they are generally tasked with performing
unfair amounts of work related to care-taking, family
hygiene, harvesting, cooking, cleaning, washing, and
so on – a result of regressive notions about “women’s
Dr Thongs said the Caribbean
region’s seasons are changing,
with consequences being
increases in coastal erosion,
habitat devastation, wildlife
loss, crop destruction, food
import bills, and emotional
distress. And impoverished
people must live in the most
disaster-prone areas as these
are appreciably cheaper.
work” and inflexible gendered divisions of labour. He
saidwomen are further exposed to risk because of their
lack of self-care due to their regular responsibility for
the safety of children and the elderly. Women are also
consistently the last to leave when disasters do strike,
Gahman added.
Dr Thongs and Dr Gahman said their socio-
geographical and political-ecological research reveals
that in the Caribbean, risk, vulnerability, and the
afflictions of disaster be they “natural,” debt, or
austerity-related disasters), are:
• spatialized (i.e. arranged and ordered in particular
and uncoincidental ways);
• overdetermined by both gender and race;
• lethally classist (i.e. on the whole, wealthier people
can afford to live in safer places and live longer,
consequently meaning poor people live in more
hazardous areas and die sooner).
Thongs and Gahman ended by suggesting that
more State support for work on poverty eradication,
structural violence (defined as “exposure to premature
death”), and slow violence (i.e. the chronic and
seemingly imperceptible degradation of communities
and ecosystems due to things like large-scale extraction,
fossil fuel burning, deforestation, toxic dumping, and
fallout frompurportedly “natural” disasters) is vital for
the wellbeing of all Caribbean societies and ecologies.
The two also said discernable university
commitments to (and institutional backing for)
research and teaching about disaster preparedness,
gender equity, class consciousness, and development
justice are necessary and urgent.
Community members in Dominica go through destruction levied by Hurricane Maria, the worst natural disaster on record to affect Dominica and Puerto Rico. The hurricane system lasted from Sept. 16 – Oct. 2, 2017,
and caused catastrophic damage and many deaths across the northeastern Caribbean, compounding recovery efforts in the areas of the Leeward Islands already struck by Hurricane Irma two weeks before (Irma system
ran from Aug. 30 – Sept. 13).
PHOTO: ROOSEVELT SKERRIT,
Storm damage from Hurricane Irma is seen in St Martin,
Sept. 7, 2017
PHOTO: THE DUTCH DEFENSE MINISTRY
