Disaster Risk Reduction and International Development

Module code: MN7638

Global warming, climate change, environmental disasters and terror threats present significant and growing threats to societies. Disasters, crises and risks cause social, economic, financial, natural and physical disruption that often most severely affect the poor and vulnerable. The ‘messiness’ that risks, crisis and disasters create require complex solutions to mitigate their impacts. Being able to manage and mitigate these threats is now seen by the United Nations as a globally valuable skill, enshrined in their three frameworks the Sustainable Development Goals (2015-2030), the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction (2015-2030) and the Paris Protocol (2015-2020). By bringing policy frameworks and case studies from the global South, this module teases out the overlap of the UN’s global frameworks in everyday practice and introduces the tools and frameworks that are widely used to assess disaster risk avoidance and resilience in resource poor contexts.

Topics covered

• International development
• Poverty and vulnerability reduction
• Gender, health, rural livelihood
• The Sustainable Development Goals, the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction, International Panel on Climate Change
• Case studies