A good read.


http://www.npr.org/2011/07/04/137526401/the-key-to-disaster-survival-friends-and-neighbors

The Key To Disaster Survival? Friends And Neighbors

by SHANKAR VEDANTAM

... ambulances and firetrucks and government aid are not the principal ways most people survive during — and recover after — a disaster.

...Rather, it is the personal ties among members of a community that determine survival during a disaster, and recovery in its aftermath.

...It's this passion for a local community and granular knowledge about who needs what that makes large-scale government interventions ineffective by comparison. It's even true when it comes to long-term recovery.

... The problem isn't that experts are dumb. It's that communities are not the sum of their roads, schools and malls. They are the sum of their relationships.

The Japanese government seems to get this. The government there actually funds block parties to bring communities together.