Integration of Critical Infrastructure and Societal Consequence Models: Impact on Swedish Power System Mitigation Decisions

Critical infrastructures provide society with services essential to its functioning, and extensive disruptions give rise to large societal consequences. Risk and vulnerability analyses of critical infrastructures generally focus narrowly on the infrastructure of interest and describe the consequences as nonsupplied commodities or the cost of unsupplied commodities; they rarely holistically consider the larger impact with respect to higher‐order consequences for the society. From a societal perspective, this narrow focus may lead to severe underestimation of the negative effects of infrastructure disruptions. To explore this theory, an integrated modeling approach, combining models of critical infrastructures and economic input–output models, is proposed and applied in a case study. In the case study, a representative model of the Swedish power transmission system and a regionalized economic input–output model are utilized. This enables exploration of how a narrow infrastructure or a more holistic societal consequence perspective affects vulnerability‐related mitigation decisions regarding critical infrastructures. Two decision contexts related to prioritization of different vulnerability‐reducing measures are considered—identifying critical components and adding system components to increase robustness. It is concluded that higher‐order societal consequences due to power supply disruptions can be up to twice as large as first‐order consequences, which in turn has a significant effect on the identification of which critical components are to be protected or strengthened and a smaller effect on the ranking of improvement measures in terms of adding system components to increase system redundancy.     

Determinants of the recovery of financially distressed nonprofits

Financial ratios are traditionally used to predict and diagnose financial vulnerability; this is helpful, but leaves unanswered how the vulnerable nonprofit should prioritize this information in order to survive. Using panel data, this empirical study observes the financial behaviors of distressed nonprofits for 4‐year periods where the first 2 years are financially vulnerable. Two definitions of vulnerability are tested: when liabilities exceed assets (insolvency) and when net assets shrink by more than 25% annually (financial disruption). In determining which nonprofits recover during the final 2 years, we find that the type of vulnerability impacts which financial indicators a nonprofit should target, and that common tactics such as improving profitability may be counterproductive. Finally, we do not find evidence for liabilities of newness or smallness in the statistical analysis.     

Vulnerability, violence and (cosmopolitan) ethics: Butler's Precarious Life

This article proposes that Butler's Precarious Life: The Powers of Mourning and Violence provides a valuable contribution to the sociology of cosmopolitanism on the basis of a perspective which forcefully addresses the new sovereign power of the USA which reneges on the possibilities of cosmopolitanization by means of resurgent nationalism, extra-legal modalities of militarization and incarceration ('the new war prison') and state powers now integrated into normalized practices of everyday governmentality. Butler's Foucauldian approach to power and subjectivity is contrasted with Beck's understanding of self-reflexivity in cosmopolitanized society. Butler's feminist-inspired approach to mourning and grief and her account of vulnerability and violence also encourage a response to recent acts of terrorism and subsequent wars by means of an ethics of non-violence. Drawing on the Levinasian concept of 'the face' Butler explores the obligation posed by 'the face' to refuse violent confrontation. The article suggests a sociological reading of Butler's ethical account which throws light on issues pertinent to the cosmopolitanization thesis, through an interrogation of the relations of power and powerlessness which underlie encounters with otherness.     

西南省区农业旱灾脆弱性综合评价:以2010年西南旱灾为例

旱灾因其引致的高经济损失及农业脆弱性吸引了众多学者关注。2010年西南特大旱灾重创了灾区农村经济,加剧了农业脆弱性,打击了农户脱贫信心。西南旱灾的形成是降水量持续偏少、生态环境恶化与农业系统脆弱共同作用的结果。其中,降低脆弱性是减少农业旱灾损失的重要途径。本文综述了农业旱灾脆弱性的研究动态,构建了农业旱灾脆弱性综合评价指标体系,并运用TOPSIS法对西南5省区农业旱灾脆弱性进行综合评价,最后提出了具有针对性的对策与建议。     

灾害概念的再认识————兼论灾害社会科学研究流派及整合趋势

“灾害”作为灾害社会科学研究的核心概念,其社会与自然双重属性特质形塑了灾害多学科交叉研究现状。学界对灾害的定义和认知多从自然科学视角出发,而基于社会科学视角的灾害概念研究尚少。对灾害概念进行社会科学解读,可以将关于灾害概念的认识划分为“事件-功能主义导向”、“脆弱性导向”、“社会建构主义导向”、“不确定性导向”、“权利资源分配导向”,并以“危险源-关系链-结果”为逻辑架构结构化灾害概念,从而廓清社会科学领域关于灾害概念认识与研究谱系,并揭示出灾害社会科学的整合研究发展趋势。     

灾害情境中的集体行动及形成逻辑

近年来,随着灾害的频发,过去很少被重视的灾害社会学研究逐渐从边缘变为主流的研究领域。面对日益复杂的灾害现象时,如何进一步与主流社会学理论对话成为当前研究中一个迫切需要解决的问题。从集体行动视角进行探讨,并初步建立起灾害集体行动类型分析的框架。在灾害处置过程中,如何发挥灾害集体行动的正面效应而规避其负面风险？这是政府和学界高度关注的重大现实和理论问题。事实证明,在“天灾”定义的情境中,灾民对于外界援助会有较高的满意度,因而能促进积极的集体行动产生。反之,在“人祸”情境定义中,灾民就会将灾害责任的焦点从“宿命论”转移到“人祸论”上,不仅会引起灾民的强烈不满和抗争性行动,还会威胁到政治安全目标及社会的稳定。政府应通过灾害信息的及时播报、正向解释以及专家诠释等方式正确引导民众的灾害情境定调。同时,政府还应从关注灾害技术层面的修复到关注弱势群体、信任机制、公私协力、柔性治理、危机管理和社会公平等综合层面治理的转变,来发挥灾害治理的理想效果。     

A qualitative study of the practices and experiences of staff in multidisciplinary child sexual exploitation partnerships in three English coastal towns

This article presents findings from a qualitative study of the practices and experiences of people working in multidisciplinary child sexual exploitation (CSE) partnerships in three coastal towns in England. The study is based on focus groups conducted with 36 practitioners from a range of professional groups, including police, social work, substance misuse, education, specialist youth workers, sexual health, and statutory and non-statutory children's services. The article begins with an overview of the three towns and the structure of their responses to CSE. It goes on to explore a range of factors, which contribute to the local issues around CSE and which affect and direct multiagency working. These include practitioner perspectives on CSE vulnerability, the discrepancy between young peoples' and practitioners' views about “exploitation”, a discussion of how CSE perpetrators initiate and develop contact with young people and the role of incentives—including drugs and alcohol—as part of CSE exploitation. We finish by drawing out some general conclusions.     

Spatially Representing Vulnerability to Extreme Rain Events Using Midwestern Farmers’ Objective and Perceived Attributes of Adaptive Capacity

Potential climate‐change‐related impacts to agriculture in the upper Midwest pose serious economic and ecological risks to the U.S. and the global economy. On a local level, farmers are at the forefront of responding to the impacts of climate change. Hence, it is important to understand how farmers and their farm operations may be more or less vulnerable to changes in the climate. A vulnerability index is a tool commonly used by researchers and practitioners to represent the geographical distribution of vulnerability in response to global change. Most vulnerability assessments measure objective adaptive capacity using secondary data collected by governmental agencies. However, other scholarship on human behavior has noted that sociocultural and cognitive factors, such as risk perceptions and perceived capacity, are consequential for modulating people's actual vulnerability. Thus, traditional assessments can potentially overlook people's subjective perceptions of changes in climate and extreme weather events and the extent to which people feel prepared to take necessary steps to cope with and respond to the negative effects of climate change. This article addresses this knowledge gap by: (1) incorporating perceived adaptive capacity into a vulnerability assessment; (2) using spatial smoothing to aggregate individual‐level vulnerabilities to the county level; and (3) evaluating the relationships among different dimensions of adaptive capacity to examine whether perceived capacity should be integrated into vulnerability assessments. The result suggests that vulnerability assessments that rely only on objective measures might miss important sociocognitive dimensions of capacity. Vulnerability indices and maps presented in this article can inform engagement strategies for improving environmental sustainability in the region.     

Rethinking Vulnerability Analysis and Governance with Emphasis on a Participatory Approach

This article draws on vulnerability analysis as it emerged as a complement to classical risk analysis, and it aims at exploring its ability for nurturing risk and vulnerability governance actions. An analysis of the literature on vulnerability analysis allows us to formulate a three‐fold critique: first, vulnerability analysis has been treated separately in the natural and the technological hazards fields. This separation prevents vulnerability from unleashing the full range of its potential, as it constrains appraisals into artificial categories and thus already closes down the outcomes of the analysis. Second, vulnerability analysis focused on assessment tools that are mainly quantitative, whereas qualitative appraisal is a key to assessing vulnerability in a comprehensive way and to informing policy making. Third, a systematic literature review of case studies reporting on participatory approaches to vulnerability analysis allows us to argue that participation has been important to address the above, but it remains too closed down in its approach and would benefit from embracing a more open, encompassing perspective. Therefore, we suggest rethinking vulnerability analysis as one part of a dynamic process between opening‐up and closing‐down strategies, in order to support a vulnerability governance framework.     

The Dangers of Assessing the Financial Vulnerability of Nonprofits Using Traditional Measures

This article analyzes the financial vulnerability of 228 British nongovernmental development organizations (NGDOs) during the period 2008–2012. To do this, we use the Financial Vulnerability Index developed by Trussel et al. (2002). This index is commonly used in the literature on nonprofit organizations. However, we observe a very poor adaptation of the index to the reality of this industry, at least in predictive terms. The article goes deeply into each of the variables that are used to calculate this index, and we offer explanations of their inadequacy to this subsector of nonprofits.