Mike,
I have just seen your enquire and the various answers given to it. I found
them useful but too confined in scope, i.e. "the rich", "the contractors",
"the disaster managers" and the like. I believe most of those who benefit
from natural disasters can do so only if the government provides the means.
The government in turn can provide the means mostly if there is significant
disaster-related capital inflows (e.g. international aid, World
Bank-low-interest, grants, remittances, etc.). The government itself
becomes then suspect (with plenty of evidence) of benefitting from all
this: redirection of aid flows to other purposes (e.g. the military or the
power elites), substitution of originally earmarked (domestic) funds for
domestic development programmes for foreign funds orientated to disaster
recovery programmes (using the the original funds for something more
political), outright corruption of both relief operators and government
officials, and the like. If you want to have a look about these and other
related issues, I suggest that you read the relevant parts of my 1993 book
on disasters. This is
Albala-Bertrand, J.M. (1993) The Political Economy of Large Natural
Disasters. With Special reference to Developing Countries (Oxford,
OUP-Clarendon Press).
ISBN 0-19-828765-8
Dr J.M. Albala-Bertrand
At 16:22 05/11/00 -0400, you wrote:
>Hello all.
>I was wondering if anyone had any ideas as to Who benefits from Natural
>Disasters (financially, or in other ways.)
> Thanks for your help
>
>Mike
>
>
>
* J.M. Albala-Bertrand *
* Department of Economics *
* Queen Mary & Westfield Colleg *
* University of London *
* Mile End Road *
* London E1 4NS *
* *
Tel +44 20 7882 5094 *
Fax +44 20 8983 3580 *
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