Sociological Inquiry and Disaster Research

This article reviews and critiques recent studies of hazards and disasters from a general sociological perspective. Historical attempts to define and interpret disasters in sociological terms are important, and such efforts inevitably raise basic questions about the social order. C. E. Fritz's earlier definition of disaster is revised to reflect the growing awareness in the field that patterns within the social order are both causes and consequences of environmental vulnerability. The revised definition points to four core dimensions of disaster: events, impacts, social units, and responses. Using the latter two for illustrative purposes, recent research on social networks and organizational forms of association related to disasters is highlighted. This section is followed by a review of the kinds of questions that sociologists have been asking about the social order, as evidenced by several recent large-scale studies. While contemporary work has greater substantive breadth and more methodological rigor than earlier studies, there are continuities over time as well. The paper closes by presenting some comments about interdisciplinary and cross-cultural research on disasters.