The research finds that while formal decentralised governance arrangements are important at the local scale to support collective action and local scale relief distribution, decentralisation of responsibility often occurs without the complete decentralisation of power and resources. However, subsistence households experienced few improvements in disaster outcomes over this period, continuing to struggle to access income and food after cyclones disrupted their agricultural source of income. Households with access to formal income and those receiving remittances had improved disaster outcomes between 19. By taking a political ecology approach, the study reveals how power dynamics within communities interact with formal governance systems.ĭespite differences between disaster outcomes experienced by all households, this research identified three ‘types’ of households, based predominantly on their primary income source, which had similar experiences. Small island developing states are relevant case studies as they are often physically small and remote, low lying, and resource poor – all of which can affect disaster outcomes.

The research problem is studied through the case study of Samoa, a typical small island developing state. This study fills a gap by researching the historical associations between disaster governance and the lived experiences of households over three decades of disasters. Studies that focus on household-scale outcomes tend to be one-off studies that do not provide longitudinal evidence of changing household experiences over time. Much of the current disaster experience research tends to use aggregate trend data of numbers of people affected, fatalities and economic loss that reveal high-level changes over time, but provide very little sense of the outcomes for different types of affected households. However, there is very little research that examines the role of decentralised disaster governance in household disaster experiences.

The decentralisation of decision-making has been proposed by scholars as a practice to improve disaster outcomes. The importance of the role of governance in reducing disaster risk has international recognition from the United Nations’ Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction.

Coming of age in samoa analysis