Hi Lisa,
Terminology and glossaries are useful for the “problem understanding” and certainly the epistemology and conceptual frameworks have been very relevant for many of us during the last three or four decades. Unfortunately, in most cases, for many researchers and officers, the terminology has been more relevant itself than the real problem understanding... Most researchers are naive or have been more interested to have, for example, papers in international journals than to get effectiveness regarding risk reduction or are professionals interested to be officers of a NGO or a national or international agency... for their modus vivendi; i.e. to be part of an incredible and now huge bureaucracy.
After the UNDRO report (1980) about the expert meeting of July 1979, many of us have been attempting to improve the conceptual frameworks. In 1990s we started to use DRM and DRR (during the IDNDR) to make emphasis in risk better than in disaster (disaster risk reduction better than disaster reduction) but today they are almost the same in most places.
At the end of 1980s Colombia had a National System for Disaster Prevention and Attention (ex ante and ex post actions) and Mexico a National System of Civil Protection (after the volcanic eruption of Nevado del Ruiz and the earthquake of 1985 respectively). During the 1990s and 2000s the Inter-American Development Bank, the World Bank and the UNDP promoted “National Systems for Disaster Risk Management” in most countries in the Americas (all created or updated by law). Most of these countries did not follow the terminology of the UNISDR. DRM was the umbrella for four public policies: Risk Knowledge (or identification/assessment/communication of risk); Risk Reduction (corrective, prospective, prescriptive); Risk Transfer (insurance and financial protection) and Disaster Management (preparedness, warning, response and recovery –rehabilitation/reconstruction). In some countries, they were missional processes and the risk transfer was included into risk reduction... but overall this is the view in the Latin American region. Clearly DRR was considered one of the components or policies of the DRM.
At the end, what is important is the purpose, the objective and in some places DRM is understood not as an agency, or as a discipline, or as a sector of development, but as: a strategy of development, or of sustainability and transformation.
All the best,
Omar-Dario
Processes for designing, implementing, and evaluating strategies, policies, and measures to improve the understanding of disaster risk, foster disaster risk reduction and transfer, and promote continuous improvement in disaster preparedness, response, and recovery practices, with the explicit purpose of increasing human security, well-being, quality of life, and sustainable development.
Disaster risk reduction (DRR)
Denotes both a policy goal or objective, and the strategic and instrumental measures employed for anticipating future disaster risk; reducing existing exposure, hazard, or vulnerability; and improving resilience.