Birkland - Policy Process Theory and Natural Hazards

Policy Process Theory and Natural Hazards

Thomas A. Birkland
Subject: Mitigation, Policy and Governance, Legal Issues Online Publication Date: Nov 2016
DOI: 10.1093/acrefore/9780199389407.013.75
Summary and Keywords
Natural disasters pose important problems for societies and governments. Governments
are charged with making policies to protect public safety. Large disasters, then, can re
veal problems in government policies designed to protect the public from the effects of
such disasters. Large disasters can serve as focusing events, a term used to describe
large, sudden, rare, and harmful events that gain a lot of attention from the public and
from policy makers. Such disasters highlight problems and, as the public policy literature
suggests, open windows of opportunity for policy change. However, as a review of United
States disaster policy from 1950 through 2015 shows, change in disaster policy is often,
but not always, driven by major disasters that act as focusing events. But the accumula
tion of experience from such disasters can lead to learning, which can be useful if later,
even more damaging and attention-grabbing events arise.
Keywords: disaster policy, public policy, natural disasters, focusing events, agenda setting, policy learning
Because of the threat of massive losses of life and property damage, natural disasters are
important problems throughout the world. Natural disasters cause hundreds (in some
cases, thousands) of deaths and billions of dollars in losses to property and economic pro
ductivity every year. While the death toll in developed countries as a result of natural dis
asters has generally declined, disasters in developing countries continue to exact a high
er cost in human lives. Repeated exposure to natural hazards means that some nations or
regions find it difficult to recover from and mitigate the effects of disasters before the
next disaster strikes.
A major role of government, regardless of the form (federal or unitary, democratic or non-
democratic, presidential or parliamentary), is the protection of its citizens and residents
from harm. Natural disasters are one of the risks that governments are charged with ad
dressing. Other risks include crime, economic privation, accidents, and disease. Natural
disasters, because of their scope and suddenness, have a particular influence on setting
agendas and inducing policy change.
Relatively small events, such as localized flooding, can test local and regional govern
ments’ capacity to effectively prepare for and mitigate such events, and to respond and
promote recovery. Large natural disasters, such as Hurricanes Katrina and Sandy, the
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date: 18 May 2020

South Asia Tsunami of 2004, the Haitian earthquake of 2010, or the Japan earthquake
and tsunami of 2011, gain considerable attention from the media (and thus, the public)
and from policy makers. Large-scale disasters tend to capture media and public attention
around the world, particularly in places that are exposed to similar hazards. Indeed, the
range of effects, from the localized effects of small-scale events, to the catastrophic ef
fects of the best known storms, tsunamis, floods, and hurricanes, suggests that the term
disaster may be inadequate to describe an event’s effects. In this essay, the term disaster
is used to describe any event that leads to a disruption in the typical lives of people in a
particular area, whether at the neighborhood, regional, or national level. But the term
catastrophe can also be employed for the largest of these disasters, where disaster is
measured by its scope—the amount of damage or the number of victims—its scale—that
is, its geographic extent—and its effects (Quarantelli, 2005). By this standard, Hurricane
Katrina was a catastrophe that crippled the city of New Orleans and staggered Louisiana
and Mississippi; by contrast, Hurricane Sandy was not catastrophic in New York and New
Jersey broadly—but in several towns and neighborhoods, it was catastrophic in that it en
tirely remade daily lives and routines.
Because such disasters focus attention on the effects of natural disasters, students of nat
ural disaster have adopted the term focusing event to describe such events and the sud
den attention paid to these problems. As a shorthand term to describe important events,
the concept is useful. But many disaster scholars have adopted this term, which origi
nates in the public policy literature, without considering its roots in policy theory (in par
ticular, John Kingdon’s [2011] discussion of the idea in terms of the “streams” metaphor
of the policy process), without a great deal of knowledge of what a focusing event is in
policy making terms, and why not every event has the potential to alter our thinking
about disaster policies. Conversely, while it is often said that disaster policy is more reac
tive than it is proactive, not all changes to policies related to natural disasters are made
in direct response to such events. Rather, other things also happen in the political realm
that influence change in disaster policies.
In this article, I explain how natural disasters influence the policy process. In particular, I
will describe how these focusing events can have important and sometimes unexpected
effects on policy making. I will turn to a discussion of the influence of events on disaster
policy in the United States. The literature on natural disaster policy in the United States
has consistently said that natural disaster policy is reactive to recent events, rather than
proactive in anticipating potential future effects and mitigating their potential harms be
fore they occur. This is also true in Europe, where events can also serve as drivers of poli
cy change (Nohrstedt, 2009). There are good reasons why our policy making institutions
tend to react to events and make policy based on recent events—that is, why policy mak
ers learn from disaster experience. However, there are times when disaster policy is made
without any apparent learning, which means that focusing events may not be influential.
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Overview: Frameworks of the Policy Process

Public policy making has been of considerable interest to social scientists for years, be
cause public policy is the expression of what governments view as problems, and what
they plan to do—or not do—about public problems. The study of public policy is the un
derstanding of how policy problems come to the attention of policy makers, how policy
makers create and evaluate alternative solutions to problems, and how policies are imple
mented to have their desired effect.
For many years, students of the public policy process in democratic societies have been
working to create models or frameworks or approaches to the study of policy making. The
earliest efforts to model some sort of policy process rested on input-output models of the
political system, most closely associated with John Easton (1965). Using various different
terminology, scholars posted some sort of policy cycle that consisted of a series of stages,
from problem identification and agenda setting, through alternative policy selection,
adoption, implementation, and feedback to the start of the process (deLeon, 1999; Naka
mura, 1987; Sabatier, 1991).
Since at least the late 1980s, these scholars have known that this is a far too simple mod
el of the policy process. The stages model implies an orderly series of steps toward enact
ment of legislation, akin to the sort of “how a bill becomes a law” discussions common in
civics textbooks. The problem is, of course, that not all policies follow this step-by-step
process. Some policies skip steps in the process, and sometimes the process halts after
agenda setting, and no change results. And feedback happens from and to all these
stages of the policy process. Thus, while what Paul Sabatier (1991) calls the “stages
heuristic” is a handy way of categorizing which aspects of policy making a scholar may be
studying, it is not a proper model of the policy process. Still, as deLeon (1999) notes, cat
egorizing elements of the policy process has been a useful way for scholars to focus on
particular aspects of policy making.
One such important element of the policy process is agenda setting. An agenda is a col
lection of problems; understandings of causes, symbols, solutions, and other elements of
public problems that come to the attention of members of the public and their govern
mental officials. Agendas exist at all levels of government. Every community and every
government entity has a collection of issues that are available for discussion. All these is
sues can be categorized based on the extent to which an institution is prepared to make a
decision to enact and implement or to reject particular policies, or, at least, to allocate
more resources or administrative attention to a problem (Gainsborough, 2009). We can
order issues from those that are furthest away from actual governmental action, such as
any idea about a problem and its solution. These ideas are contained in the “systemic
agenda,” which contains any idea that could possibly be considered by participants in the
policy process in a particular system.
Agenda setting is the process by which groups compete to move issues from the systemic
agenda to the institutional agenda. The systemic agenda “consists of all issues that are
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commonly perceived by members of the political community as meriting public attention

and as involving matters within the legitimate jurisdiction of existing governmental
authority” (Cobb & Elder, 1983, p. 86). If a problem or idea is successfully elevated from
the systemic agenda, it moves to the institutional agenda, which is “that list of items ex
plicitly up for the active and serious consideration of authoritative decision makers.” If an
issue moves “up” on the institutional agenda, to the point where, say, a committee must
vote on a bill, the issue reaches the decision agenda, at which point a decision making
body must do something, either by enacting some sort of policy change, or choosing not
to do so.
Group competition to set the agenda is fierce because no society, political system, official
actor, unofficial actor, or individual person has the capacity to address all possible alter
natives to all possible problems that arise at any one time (Baumgartner & Jones, 2009;
Cobb & Elder, 1983; Walker, 1977). Even when an issue gains attention, groups must fight
to ensure that their depiction of the issue remains in the forefront and that their pre
ferred approaches to the problem are those that are most actively considered. At the
same time, groups fight to keep issues off the agenda. This competition is why agenda
setting is interesting to political scientists: “the definition of the alternatives is the
supreme instrument of power” (Schattschneider, 1975, p. 66), where alternatives can
mean issues, events, problems, and solutions.
Group competition in agenda setting is both about raising an issue on the agenda and
about the competition over problem definitions and solutions. This story telling is impor
tant because stories of problem definition compete with other problem definitions, and
strongly signal pre-existing preferences for particular policies (Birkland & Lawrence,
2009; Hilgartner & Bosk, 1988). The agenda setting process is, therefore, a system of sift
ing issues, problems, ideas, and implicit solutions, because so often in policy debate, the
definition of a problem presupposes the solution to the problem. For example, after the
1999 Columbine High School shootings, the issue of school violence quickly rose to na
tional prominence, to a much greater extent than it had after other incidents of school vi
olence. Competition for attention then was about depictions of school violence as a result
of, among other things, lax parenting, easy access to guns, or the influence of popular cul
ture (TV, movies, video games) on high school students (Birkland & Lawrence, 2009;
Lawrence & Birkland, 2004). This competition over why the Columbine shootings hap
pened and what could be done to prevent future school shootings was quite fierce, more
so than the competition between school violence and the other issues vying for attention
at the time.
Interest groups, or, more often, groups of groups called advocacy coalitions (Jenkins-
Smith, Nohrstedt, Weible, & Sabatier, 2014) seek to gain attention in different venues (na
tional, state, or local governments, the legislative, executive, or judicial branches, and so
on), to elevate these issues on the agenda (see also Pralle, 2006). They also seek to keep
the issues of other groups off the agenda; indeed, agenda denial may be a more important
strategy in policy debate than promoting ideas on the agenda (Cobb & Ross, 1997).
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Kingdon’s multiple streams approach is an attempt to be a model of the policy process in

political institutions. In Kingdon’s model, inspired by Cohen, March, and Olsen’s (1972)
work on organizational decision making, three conceptual streams describe agenda-set
ting and alternative selection. These are the problem stream, which contains ideas about
various problems in society to which public policy might be applied; the politics stream,
containing the ebb and flow of electoral politics, public opinion, and the like; and the poli
cy stream, which contains a set of ideas about how problems could be addressed. In all
three streams, problems and solutions, and the means by which to implement solutions to
solve problems, are not self-evident, but are subject to considerable debate and conflict.
As noted, competition is fierce over which problem definition and policy alternative will
dominate the debate and lead to change.
A window of opportunity opens when the streams come together at a moment in time
where problems are matched with solutions, usually through the efforts of policy entre
preneurs who remain consistent actors in the policy process. Policy entrepreneurs in
clude elected officials, government officials, interest group leaders, and the like who har
ness knowledge of substantive policy and knowledge of the policy-making process to pro
mote ideas for policy change. Policy entrepreneurs may be aided by changes in politics
that make a window of opportunity arise. Many of these ideas have existed for a long
time, but a change in the streams may push the issue up the agenda and will open a win
dow of opportunity for change.
Kingdon argues that agenda setting is driven by two broad phenomena: changes in indi
cators of underlying problems (such as data about unemployment, disease, teen pregnan
cy, or crime); and focusing events, or sudden shocks to policy systems that rapidly in
crease attention to a suddenly revealed problem. In the streams approach, a focusing
event opens windows of opportunity because events provide an urgent, symbol-rich exam
ple of claimed policy failure (Birkland, 1997, 2006; May, 1992). They therefore change the
nature of the politics surrounding an issue. However, a focusing event by itself is often an
insufficient driver of agenda. Change comes, according to Kingdon, with “a powerful sym
bol that catches on, or the personal experience of a policy maker” (2011, pp. 94–95). For
example, while Katrina was a very large hurricane, it took on even greater symbolic im
portance when, for example, images of an elderly lady using an American flag as a blan
ket, or people stranded on rooftops, were widely propagated in the news as both symbols
of problems in their own right, and as symbols of policy failure, because, normatively,
people should not need to seek refuge on rooftops or use a flag as a blanket.
Kingdon’s conception of disasters as focusing events involves events that “simply bowl
over everything standing in the way of prominence on the agenda” (Kingdon, 2011, p. 96)
is a useful starting point, because such events usually involve disasters that concentrate
their obvious damage and harms in one place, thereby providing opportunities for atten
tion. Kingdon’s discussion of the idea of a focusing event is very influential to those of us
who study disasters and crises, but few scholars have tested the idea across a long period
of time in a policy domain that addresses natural hazards broadly, or specific natural haz
ard domains, such as earthquakes and hurricanes. Most disaster policy research adopts
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this “bowling over” notion, and assumes that the event so dominates the agenda that talk
of policy change—that is, learning the “lessons” of the recent event—is the normatively
desirable result, because the event itself often reveals policy failures from which we nor
matively expect to learn (Birkland, 2006; drawing heavily on May, 1992).
Before concluding this discussion, it is important to understand that Kingdon’s streams

approach is not the only major approach to the study of public policy. The discussion that
follows also draws on fundamentals of the Advocacy Coalition Framework (ACF), associat
ed most closely with Paul Sabatier and other scholars who have advanced the ACF as a
way of explaining group competition, learning, and policy change (Jenkins-Smith et al.,
2014). Another very influential framework is the Punctuated Equilibrium Theory (PET), in
which Frank Baumgartner and Bryan Jones have described how policy making undergoes
long periods of stasis, punctuated by sudden policy changes. Both the ACF and PET take
sudden, attention-grabbing events into account as drivers of policy change. In the ACF,
events can be exogenous shocks that create new coalitions to press for policy change; in
PET, such events can change the policy image of existing policy from positive to negative,
causing pressure to move away from status-quo policies. This is, of course, a highly sim
plified depiction of these approaches to policy studies. Their influence on how we think
about natural disasters in the policy process will be illustrated in the balance of this arti
cle.
Focusing Events in the Policy Process

Most attention to natural disasters in policy studies can be located in the literature on
agenda setting. This is sensible, as natural disasters are powerful agenda setters. John
Kingdon understood this in terms of focusing events. Cobb and Elder called events such
as the Santa Barbara oil spill of 1969 a particular sort of issue initiator they called a cir
cumstantial reactor that changed the political climate (Cobb & Elder, 1983, p. 83).
Throughout their application of the idea of punctuated equilibrium to the policy process,
Baumgartner and Jones (2009) note that events are important in altering the agenda, cre
ating new or newly important information, and creating opportunities for change.
This change opportunity is important, because, in Baumgartner and Jones’ punctuated

equilibrium theory (PET), long periods of policy stasis are punctuated by sudden, often-
unexpected shocks to the system. These shocks are usually only predictable in the sense
that a major event, such as a natural disaster, will happen at some uncertain time in the
future. Some hazards, such as floods or hurricanes, may be more likely at certain times of
the year, such as during monsoon or hurricane seasons. But others, such as earthquakes,
are wholly unpredictable. And while emergency managers may be prepared for typical
natural disasters, particularly large ones can create substantial shocks to policy making,
creating a greater likelihood of policy change. This is because, as Baumgartner and Jones
note, sudden events are often negative events from the perspective of the most powerful
actors in a policy domain, because these powerful actors are often most interested in
maintaining the policy status quo.
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With this negative attention, then, come calls for policy change, often made on behalf of
the less powerful members of a community; this is consistent with E. E. Schattschneider’s
notions of the “scope and bias of the pressure system,” in which those who favor the sta
tus quo seek to avoid broader public debate and conflict (Schattschneider, 1975, p. 20).
But Baumgartner and Jones also note that “simply because a disadvantaged interest pro
poses a new interpretation of events and attempts to attract the attention of allies in oth
er areas of the political system does not mean that those challengers will be success
ful” (2009, p. 8). After all, while the Exxon Valdez (1989) and Deepwater Horizon (2010)
oil spills were the biggest of their type in U.S. history, the legislative and regulatory reac
tion to these events was neither as punitive to the oil industry as the industry had feared
—or the environmental movements had hoped.
Because we cannot know in advance whether an event will be a focusing event, Birkland
defined a potential focusing event as an event that is:
sudden, relatively rare, can be reasonably defined as harmful or revealing the pos
sibility of potentially greater future harms, inflicts harms or suggests potential
harms that are or could be concentrated on a definable geographical area or com
munity of interest, and that is known to policy makers and the public virtually si
multaneously.
(Birkland, 1997, p. 22)
A focusing event can serve as prima facie evidence of policy failure (May, 1992) that
needs to be addressed to prevent a recurrence of the negative outcomes of the event. The
public and policy makers need to understand the event and its causes. This process in
volves telling what Deborah Stone calls causal stories about why the event was as bad as
it was (Stone, 1989; see also Stone, 2012). A key feature of the politics of such events
turns on the arguments the advocates make in a policy domain, about whether an event
was unintentionally or purposefully caused. Where events are the result of neglect or
carelessness, we find greater debate over the nature and solutions for the event and the
problem it revealed than we have traditionally seen with “acts of God.”
The reason events are important is that they attract attention to problems, which, in turn,
increases the likelihood that organized interests, including some that are influential and
powerful, could enter policy debates and advocate policy change (Baumgartner & Jones,
2009; Schattschneider, 1975). Most of the attention triggered by a focusing event is nega
tive attention, which further motivates political debate, and potentially moves issues clos
er the decision agenda.
The foregoing discussion should not be taken to mean that policy change is a typical or
inevitable result of a focusing event. The nature of event-driven policy change is very
complex and is comprised of many actors in many different types of policy subsystems,
depending on the event itself and the policy actors an event stimulates (Nohrstedt &
Weible, 2010). Even if policy change does result, the change may not be the “best” policy
change, as judged by experts in the field. For example, continued legislation to broaden
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availability of disaster relief funding may be helpful to the survivors of an accident in the
near term, but such funding, or the accompanying sort of responses, such as larger flood
walls or levees, may not substantially reduce a community’s vulnerability to disaster and
may increase the likelihood of a future, more damaging event.
Focusing Events and Disaster Legislation in the United States, 1950

to 2015
In simplest terms, I argue that big disasters become focusing events, and that such large
disasters generate policy change and, perhaps, learning. If this is the case, we should be
able to link particular events to particular significant legislative enactments at the federal
level. To assess this idea, I list major federal disaster policy enactments in Table 1.
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Table 1. Significant disaster legislation in the United States, 1950–

2014 (adapted from May & Williams, 1986)
Year Legisla Related Event Summary

tion
1950 Disaster Formalized existing prac

Relief Act tice allowing for funding
of 1950, to repair local public fa
PL 81-875 cilities.
1956 Federal Flood insurance program

Flood In that never started be
surance cause the House rejected
Act, PL funding for it.
84-1016
1965 Flood Hurricane Betsy More fully engaged the

Control (1965) Army Corps of Engineers
Act of to work with the Orleans
1965, PL Parish Levee Board to
89-298 Ti build levees and related
tle II works. The Corps as
sumed responsibility for
building this flood protec
tion system and for a sys
tem in south Louisiana.
The design storm for this
system was not as strong
as was recommended by
NOAA. Local levee
boards retained mainte
nance responsibility. The
act authorized other flood
control projects national
ly.
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1966 Disaster Alaska earth Amended 1950 act to al

Relief Act quake of 1964; low rural communities to
of 1966, Midwest tornado participate; aid for dam
PL 89-769 outbreak of Palm aged higher education fa
Sunday 1965, cilities; repair of public
Hurricane Betsy facilities under construc
of 1965 tion. Created office of
emergency planning
(OEP). Broadened eligi
bility for aid to rural com
munities, public universi
ties, and colleges, SBA
loans to private universi
ties and colleges, and em
powers feds to partici
pate more in wildland
firefighting. Expansive
program that reflected
current New Deal priori
ties (Morris, 2014).
1968 National Hurricane Betsy, First flood insurance pro

Flood In and reaction to gram, enacted as Title
surance continued ad hoc VIII of the Housing and
Act of relief policy after Development Act.
1968, PL the 1964 Alaska
90-448. earthquake
(Knowles & Kun
reuther, 2014)
1969 Disaster Hurricane Debris removal, food aid,

Relief Act Camille (1969) unemployment benefits,
of 1969, loan programs revised;
PL 91-79 duration limited to fifteen
months.
1970 Disaster Hurricane Continues most provi

Assis Camille (1969) sions of the 1969 law,
tance Act plus grants for temporary
of 1970, housing or relocation,
PL 91-606 funding for legal services.
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1973 Flood Dis Hurricane Agnes Expanded coverage; im

aster Pro (1972) posed sanctions on com
tection munities in flood zones
Act of that failed to participate
1973, PL in flood insurance. Made
93-234. purchase of insurance
mandatory in “special
flood hazard areas.”
1974 Disaster Hurricane Agnes Defined “major disasters”

Relief (1972) and “emergencies,”
Amend broadened categories of
ments of allowable expenditures.
1974, PL Served as template for
93-288 most policy until the
Stafford Act. In 1977, this
act was reauthorized
through 1980 (PL 95-51).
It was reauthorized in
1980 (PL 96-568). Solidi
fied disaster relief as
something approaching
an entitlement program
(Morris, 2014).
1977 National 1964 Alaska and Bill enacted to address

Earth 1971 Sylmar concerns raised by Alas
quake (California) earth ka and San Fernando
Hazards quakes. earthquakes, among oth
Reduc er events. Included provi
tion Act, sions to support research
PL 95-124 on prediction and mitiga
tion.
1988 Robert T. No precipitating Amends Disaster Relief

Stafford event. This enact Amendments of 1974.
Disaster ment was a reac Clarifies presidential dis
Relief and tion to Reagan aster declarations, in
Emer administration at creased emphasis on mit
gency As tempts to change igation. Removed federal
sistance cost sharing for emphasis on disaster re
Act, PL mulas with covery.
100-707 states.
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1993 Stafford Midwest floods of Amended the Stafford Act

Act 1993 to emphasize mitigation;
Amend enacted in the aftermath
ments, of the 1993 Midwest
103-181 floods.
2000 Disaster Hurricane Fran, Encourages state and lo

Mitiga other floods cal hazard mitigation, re
tion Act, quires enhanced state
PL and local mitigation plan
106-390 ning.
2002 Home September 11 Made FEMA a part of the

land Se terrorist attacks new Department of
curity Homeland Security as, of
Act, PL ficially, the Emergency
107-296 Preparedness and Re
sponse Directorate.
Moved FEMA further
from a direct line to the
president. Terrorism be
came the most important
hazard in the eyes of fed
eral leaders at the time.
2004 Flood In Indicator driven Provisions to encourage

surance —realization that owners of repetitively
Reform flood insurance flooded properties to ac
Act of was not risk cept buyouts or lose eligi
2004, PL based or actuari bility for flood insurance.
108-264 ally sound
2004 National Result of efforts Creates a National Wind

Wind of the wind haz storm Impact Reduction
storm Im ard and storm Program patterned after
pact Re surge research the Earthquake Program.
duction community to ad Part of the Earthquake
Act of dress these haz program reauthorization.
2004, Ti ards in a way
tle II of similar to earth
PL quakes under the
108-360 NEHRP.
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2006 Post-Kat Hurricane Katri Reestablished FEMA as a

rina na formal entity in DHS;
Emer designated FEMA Admin
gency istrator as lead for na
Manage tional disaster response;
ment Re reestablished direct re
form Act port of FEMA administra
of 2006 tor. To the president in
disasters.
2012 Biggert– Indicator-driven: Required flood insurance

Waters huge deficits in to be priced using actuar
Flood In the flood insur ial data, thereby remov
surance ance program. ing subsidies.
Reform These deficits,
Act of however, were
2012 generated by
Hurricane Katri
na: “The NFIP
paid out more
claims in 2005,
however, than it
had paid out over
the entire life of
the program to
that point” (citing
Hayes & Neal,
2011; Kousky &
Kunreuther,
2013, p. 3)
2013 Disaster Hurricane Sandy Funds several federal

Relief Ap agencies for recovery op
propria erations after Hurricane
tions Act Sandy. Funding for direct
of 2013 use by federal agencies,
(PL and for the provision of
113-2) aid through federal pro
grams to states and local
governments.
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2014 Home Indicator driven: Delayed implementation

owner large increases in of actuarial rates for four
Flood In insurance rates years.
surance led to political
Afford controversy
ability Act
of 2014
Events are very important in the natural disaster domain in the United States. This histo
ry illustrates what Morris (2014) termed “a call-and- response pattern of major disasters
producing increasing levels of assistance from Congress after World War II” (p. 407). In
deed, this increasing tendency to create broader groups of interests eligible for disaster
relief, and the increasing generosity of such relief, reflects them as a “ratcheting up” of
federal policy, yielding broader and deeper federal involvement in what has traditionally
been a local responsibility (May & Williams, 1986). Indeed, all federal disaster policy is
marked, first, by the reiteration that disaster preparedness, response, recovery, and miti
gation is primarily a local and state function, with the federal government playing a sup
port role; and, second, by the continued growth in federal involvement in planning for dis
asters, supporting response, and encouraging better response and recovery.
This table shows several important enactments and related events. However, this history
starts with the Disaster Relief Act of 1950, which was less the result of any single event
than of the accumulation of experience with ad-hoc federal responses to disasters that
date to the earliest days of the republic. The 1950 act was an attempt to create a system
for the orderly provision of aid to states upon a request from the governor of a stricken
state. The law established the doctrine that prevails in the United States: “to supplement
the efforts and available resources of States, local governments, and disaster relief orga
nizations in alleviating the damage, loss, hardship, or suffering caused” by a disaster
(now codified at 42 U.S.C. 5122). Primary responsibility is to rest with the state and local
governments. This doctrine is reflected in the nature of federal disaster relief organiza
tion—no federal emergency management organization has ever been very large, and FE
MA has less than 3,000 people, most of whom work with state and local governments.
The 1950 act was also an attempt to routinize the process for seeking and granting feder
al disaster assistance to state and local government. Congress has, since this act, sought
to create a system of predictability that will allow what Lindsay and Murray (2011) call
“normal disasters” that do not unduly tax federal relief funds. But while the doctrine and
the sense of a disaster declaration process remain the key features of federal law, many
disasters triggered changes to the law to broaden the scope of federal assistance. Enact
ments in 1966, 1969, 1970, and 1974 were linked to experiences with particular disas
ters.
The 1974 Disaster Relief Act was a second landmark body of legislation. This established
a basic framework that continues to this day. This enactment rested on the doctrine that
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the federal government supports state and local efforts, but it also greatly broadened the
range of aid that could be offered to state and local governments and, for the first time,
provided a system of direct aid to individuals harmed in the disaster.
The next major event, although not legislative in nature, was the establishment, in 1979,
of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) though Reorganization Plan No.
3 of 1978. The period between 1979 and the late 1980s was characterized by very few
major disasters. During this period, FEMA was charged with a much broader range of civ
il defense and national security tasks, and its director for most of the Reagan Administra
tion, Louis Giuffrida, was an enthusiastic proponent of FEMA as a national security
agency. This raised considerable ire among other executive branch officials and Con
gress, and FEMA’s authority was constrained by the enactment of the Robert T. Stafford
Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act of 1988. With the Stafford Act, as imple
mented through a series of executive orders, FEMA finally had something like an en
abling statute. The Stafford Act’s genesis, however, is not found in any one disaster event.
Sylves notes that in “April 1986, FEMA proposed changing the process of declaring disas
ters, the criteria for eligibility for federal assistance, and the nonfederal responsibility for
major disasters. The proposed regulations would have decreased the federal share of dis
aster costs to 50 percent from 75% … Due to strong opposition in Congress, FEMA subse
quently withdrew the proposed rules” (Sylves, 2015, p. 70). The Stafford Act, therefore,
placed FEMA at the center of federal natural disaster policy, rebuffed the Reagan
administration’s efforts to reduce federal cost sharing, and introduced a significant new
hazard mitigation program while, curiously, removing disaster recovery as an important
federal function. Direct experience with flooding in the Midwest in 1992 led to the enact
ment of the Stafford Act Amendments of 1993, which created a much more robust hazard
mitigation program, while Hurricane Floyd in 1999, and experience with the implementa
tion of the 1993 act led to the enactment of the Hazard Mitigation Act of 2000. During the
same period, FEMA established a mitigation directorate in 1994, and created a public-pri
vate partnership program called Project Impact that was designed to increase community
involvement in hazard mitigation. This program—and a great deal of funding and effort
for mitigation—was slashed upon the inauguration of the Bush Administration in 2001.
Of course, 2001 was also when terrorists attacked the World Trade Center and the Penta
gon. These spectacular events yielded profound changes to national security and emer
gency management policy, and the emergency management structure in the United
States returned, in many ways, to a civil defense posture. While federal officials contin
ued, after September 11, to insist that preparedness for terrorist attacks was part of an
all hazards approach, there were troubling signs that federal emergency management
would be less effective. While FEMA retained its name, it was buried deep in the Depart
ment of Homeland Security (DHS) bureaucracy, and its administrator’s access to the
president was constrained. While the agency performed reasonably well during four sig
nificant hurricanes that struck Florida in 2004, this was likely more the result of solid
preparedness in Florida, a state prone to hurricanes, than federal action. In any event,
the stage was set for Hurricane Katrina.
Page 15 of 25
date: 18 May 2020

Hurricane Katrina is striking because it revealed how much FEMA’s capacity and commit
ment had atrophied since it was buried in the DHS. While FEMA in any form would have
been severely challenged by the catastrophic storm that Katrina became, its response in
Louisiana and Mississippi was broadly considered inept, and the criticisms leveled at FE
MA sounded very similar to those leveled against it during its equally inept response to
Hurricane Andrew in Florida in 1992.
Katrina was clearly a focusing event, and it led directly to the enactment of the Post-Kat
rina Emergency Reform Act of 2006 (PKEMRA), which restored FEMA’s administrative
autonomy to some extent. Major preparedness functions housed in other agencies were
returned to or moved to FEMA, and the FEMA administrator’s title was changed to “di
rector,” with a reporting line directly to the Secretary of DHS. And the storm and the poor
response led to a shift in federal planning away from the National Response Plan to a new
National Response Framework.
This is clearly a brief summary. What this history reveals is that disaster policy is, more
than most policy domains, clearly driven by disasters. But not all such policy is disaster
driven, meaning that disaster policy shares similar characteristics with most other public
policies—change driven by proponents of policy who can, at times, use events to gain
greater attention, but who, at other times, must rely on other arguments or accumulated
experience from past disasters.
Variation in the Focal Power of Disasters

Most of the literature on disasters as focusing events does not adopt the potential focus
ing event definition, and merely claims that key historic events were focusing events,
such as in the Disaster Time Line (Rubin, Renda-Tanali, & Cumming, 2009). For example,
Farley et al. (2007) state that “Catastrophes have a long history of serving as focusing
events that open policy windows, often resulting in profound societal change,” and cite
the Johnstown Flood of 1889, the Mississippi River floods of 1927, and the September 11
attacks. They do not cite any events that had little or no focal event; in short, they, like
most scholars who adopt the focusing event concept, do something social scientists call
“selecting on the dependent variable.” This means that they and other scholars often
study major events and extrapolate from that idea that all disasters, by and large, are fo
cusing events. This is problematic; some events gain more attention than others, some
events have different policy effects than others (sometimes, little or no effect, or the
“wrong” effect from the perspective of the disaster management community). Literature
grounded in the policy process literature, such as Gerber (2007) adopts my definition of
potential focusing events and adopts key elements of the “event-related policy change”
model of the disaster policy process. Such models can accommodate the idea that some
policies change as a result of something other than major focusing events, and that, con
versely, some policy change is not attributable to a single event or to events themselves,
but that they are the result of other factors.
Page 16 of 25
date: 18 May 2020

How are disasters potential focusing events? Recalling my definition of potential focusing
events, disasters gain massive public and elite attention—at least for a short while—be
cause of the obvious signs of the harm done by the event. News media, in particular, pro
duce many stories about disasters, including stories of survivors and what they will do
next, of the heroic or futile efforts of “first responders” to help those in need, the success
or failure of government preparedness and response, and, usually contrary to what actu
ally happens, the news media carry stories of actual or feared looting or civil disorder
(Tierney, Bevc, & Kuligowski, 2006), particularly when covering disaster stories in less
developed nations. Indeed, one of the challenges for disaster professionals is confronting
the media’s propagation of myths about disasters (Clarke, 2002).
But in dealing with the political environment as it is, not as we would want it to be, we
need to understand that all this news coverage, and the related public discourse from
politicians and other leaders, regardless of its accuracy, becomes part of the “primordial
soup” of ideas that these events add to and stir up. This is to say that there is not an auto
matic or smooth translation between a disaster, the stories of fault and blame told after
the event (typically about response, not about causes or preparedness), and the policy
changes that result.
In understanding how focusing events influence policy, we have to understand that disas
ter events do not merely “impact” politics; rather, disasters are fully embedded in poli
tics. The responses to such events will use policies that have already been developed, in
political institutions, and the events will reveal, for the most part, the shortcomings in the
management of responses to these events.
What makes disasters rather different is the nature of the political and policy-oriented
discourse around disasters. In most policy domains, when something bad happens, we
would expect that pro-change policy entrepreneurs would seek to use the event to pro
mote change against the wishes of more powerful interests. We often conceive of mobi
lization of pressure for policy change to work against the most powerful economic and
policy elites, which tend to dominate policy making. This is consistent with what we call a
“conflict model” of policy making and discourse around events, such as oil spills (see also
Gunter, 2005; Molotch & Lester, 1975). I reviewed politics of this sort in my discussion of
the politics of oil spills and nuclear power plant accidents (Birkland, 1997, chs 4 and 5).
However, there are very few groups that mobilize around the problem of natural hazard
losses after a disaster. My research into the nature of policy discourse in congressional
committees charged with managing disasters found that, after earthquakes and hurri
canes there is considerable effort on the part of local officials to press the federal govern
ment for more generous and more rapidly delivered disaster relief. But between events,
while there is very little discussion of topics other than the delivery of disaster relief after
hurricanes, in the earthquake domain, there is considerable inter-event discussion of the
scientific and technical aspects of earthquake hazards and their mitigation (Birkland,
1998). In this way, natural disaster policy can be thought of as “policies without
publics” (May, 1990), where such policies yield internal mobilization (Cobb & Elder, 1983)
Page 17 of 25
date: 18 May 2020

efforts among experts to promote policy changes that the public generally do not press
for, because such policy interventions are often too technical, and because the sorts of
policies being proposed are public goods around which interest group mobilization is un
likely to promote the change that policy elites or experts believe will actually improve the
performance of, in this case, disaster policy.
These “policies without publics” make it less likely for there to be many pro-status quo
and pro-change groups, aligned in what Sabatier and his followers have called “advocacy
coalitions” (Jenkins-Smith et al., 2014; Sabatier, 1988; Sabatier & Jenkins-Smith, 1999) in
the disaster policy domain. Typically, most policy domains will contain two to four com
peting advocacy coalitions that support or oppose policy change. My research has found
that there are few such advocacy coalitions—in earthquake policy, a coalition of scientists
and other professional advocates for better earthquake mitigation policies—while no such
coalition appears to exist in the hurricane domain, and, when a focusing event mobilizes
broader participation, both earthquake and hurricane policy debate focuses on disaster
relief. But in the absence of a recent event, participants in making improved earthquake
mitigation policy are much more active than are advocates for inter-event improvements
to hurricane mitigation, to the extent they are organized and exist at all.
The professions that deal most closely with disasters—engineering, meteorology, emer
gency management, and the like—may mobilize because they believe their ideas are tech
nically, professionally, and ethically correct. I found that scientific and technical expertise
has dominated the discussion of earthquakes to a far greater extent than occurs in discus
sions about hurricanes, even as the latter hazard may well need more attention from sci
entists and technical experts. However, the “easier” solutions to earthquakes may be
more likely found among ideas developed and promoted by scientists and engineers, such
as through changes in building practices. The “obvious” solutions to mitigating hurricane
hazards—strict coastal development regulations, or active retreat from the riskiest areas
—are usually the most controversial, and are more subject to debates based on political
values and public desires than on weighing technical alternatives.
Consider Charles Perrow’s (2008) pessimistic finding about the power of Hurricane Katri
na to yield meaningful change:
Hurricane Katrina in 2005 has not proved to be a wake-up call for addressing hur
ricane vulnerabilities. New building goes on in all the southeastern coastal areas,
and despite the recommendations of experts, flooded areas of New Orleans are
being resettled … Rather than wait for another Katrina to depopulate vulnerable
area, we should forbid further building in vulnerable areas and relocate the most
vulnerable populations.
(Perrow, 2008, p. 734)
One might argue that Perrow’s call to abandon the most physically vulnerable areas is the
most obvious solution. Yet, it was also extremely controversial, because it failed to take
into account the long-term assurances many in New Orleans had been given that their
Page 18 of 25
date: 18 May 2020

property was safe from storms, and it failed to take into account the communities that
had developed, over time, in areas that, it turns out, were particularly vulnerable to disas
ters, but where appropriate risk information was neither used nor communicated to peo
ple most vulnerable to such a storm (Cooper & Block, 2006). Such a storm had been an
ticipated and tested under the Hurricane Pam scenario, a simulation exercise that sought
to identify areas of weakness in preparedness and plans for response, but little effective
action followed this exercise (Mycoff, 2007, p. 16; Scavo, Kearney, & Kilroy, 2007, p. 98),
so whatever lessons could have been derived from that were not learned before Katrina.
Even if we had better scientific information about the impending Hurricane Katrina, the
question of what do to ensure that city’s safety from wind, rain, and storm surge tran
scends simple scientific solutions, and enters the realm of trans-scientific problems that
involve conflicts of preferences or values that are not easily understood in terms of sci
ence (Majone, 1989, p. 3). In this light, the politics of focusing events generally, and disas
ters in particular, are remarkably complex.
Disasters, Focusing Events, and Policy Learn

ing
Disasters, like all focusing events, do not happen within a social, political, or economic
vacuum. Looking at one individual “event” does not tell us much about what learning
processes might have occurred after a disaster. Essentially, to comprehend policy change,
research cannot analyze the attributes of a single event at the event level, but instead it is
necessary to look at the domain level and consider multiple events. It is necessary to
study focusing events as drivers of agenda change and policy change over several
decades, and that learning is an iterative and accumulative process.
The public and, to some extent, theorists agree that events should yield policy change,
and when they do not, the failure to “learn the lessons” of an event is prima facie evi
dence of dysfunctional governance. And, indeed, in many events, one instance does not
yield positive change. But if we stopped our analysis here, rather than taking the long-
term view, we would see a particular event as “failing” to yield change and learning. The
longer view allows us to consider how domains allocate both immediate attention and
change or the accumulation of experience and learning. In simplest terms, the first event
of one kind—say, a mass casualty terrorist incident—may be largely met with bafflement,
but government, the public, and the news media may react to subsequent events using
ideas and frames developed in earlier events. In this way, events can yield the accumula
tion of knowledge about the substance of policies and about effective arguments about
policy change. Peter May (1992) calls the former type of learning policy learning, and the
latter type political learning. Within policy learning, May argues that we can see evidence
of “instrumental policy learning,” which involves learning about the effectiveness and na
ture of the policy instruments intended to yield desired outcomes, or “social policy learn
ing,” which involves learning about the more fundamental causes of such learning. Birk
Page 19 of 25
date: 18 May 2020

land (2006, 2009) argues that these two types of learning are akin to what Argyris (1976)
calls “single loop” and “double loop” learning.
I have argued that events can have an immediate influence on policy, or they may not
have a detectable influence on policy, but may contribute to experience about the prob
lems revealed by events. This process is shown in Figure 1.
Figure 1. A model of event-related policy learning

(Birkland, 2006, Figure 1.2).
We may also see evidence of May’s notion of superstitious learning, in which policy mak
ers adopt policy changes in response to events or other stimuli based on an unsubstanti
ated belief that the new policies somehow respond to the problems raised by the recent
event (Birkland, 2006). The September 11 attacks are an example of this sort of supersti
tious learning, in which all manner of policy changes were advanced in support of the
“war on terrorism,” thereby creating a real but incoherent policy regime around the dif
fuse notion of homeland security (May, Jochim, & Sapotichne, 2011).
As Figure 1 suggests, events that do rise on the agenda can also generate experience
about events, which can be tapped later when more fundamental policy change is de
sired. Disasters appear to behave like the sort of focusing events that can trigger learn
ing. A prima facie case can be made that there is strong evidence of instrumental learn
ing after disasters, either in the near-term or later, as experience accumulates. For exam
ple, experience with the law’s unclear standards for the sorts of events that could be con
sidered major disasters led to clarification in the 1988 Stafford Act. The 1993 Midwest
floods powerfully highlighted the shortcomings of existing flood policy and the need to
devote more effort to hazard mitigation, and a series of policy instruments—such as buy
outs and planning mandates—were developed to promote this goal. Such a goal was also
institutionalized in FEMA in the mitigation directorate.
Page 20 of 25
date: 18 May 2020

On the other hand, we have considerable evidence of superstitious learning and political
learning in this domain. Proponents for broader and more generous aid were able to use
events as a reason for significant policy change, by appealing to policy makers’—and the
public’s—sympathy for disaster victims. This political learning made advocates more ef
fective in expanding the scope of federal disaster policy. After September 11, the putative
lessons of that event included the need, never clearly articulated, to create a Department
of Homeland Security (itself a questionable move) and to bury FEMA under several layers
of bureaucracy. Diminishing FEMA’s visibility and role, and the decision to, once again,
have it led by inexperienced political appointees, suggested considerable unlearning of
the lessons that led to the appointment of professional leadership at FEMA in the early
1990s.
This illustrates the extent to which spillovers from one policy domain can influence anoth
er domain, particularly when the ascendant domain gains so much attention. FEMA was
caught in the post-September 11 spillover, as were a wide range of other federal, state,
and local functions, ranging from local law enforcement, to aviation security, to food safe
ty and security. In a way, emergency management moved from being a relatively well-
bounded policy regime to being a part of a less coherent policy regime that ran into trou
ble when the “old style” of disaster—Hurricane Katrina—revealed the new regime’s short
comings.
Conclusion
Natural disasters often work as focusing events that gain a lot of attention and drive poli
cy change. Not every disaster drives policy change, and not every policy change is driven
by a recent and obvious disaster. But there is little doubt that disasters matter in the mak
ing of disaster policy in the United States. They gain considerable attention, mobilize pro
fessionals and some lay people to press for improved policy, and the experiences gained
from these events inform policy makers as they make new policy. Perhaps most impor
tant, major disasters are signals that if we do not prepare for, respond to, recover from,
and mitigate the harms of future disasters, we are doomed to repeat the damage and suf
fering that these disasters—and, more properly, our decisions about hazards—can do to
people and communities. Focusing events can, when carefully considered and under
stood, teach important lessons that, if put into practice, can reduce future suffering.
Suggested Readings
Birkland, T. A. (1997) After disaster. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press.
Birkland, T. A. (2006) Lessons of disaster. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press.
Birkland, T. A. (2015) An introduction to the policy process (4th ed.). New York: Rout
ledge.
Page 21 of 25
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Godschalk, D., Beatley, T., Berke, P., & Brower, D. (2000). Natural hazard mitigation: Re
casting disaster policy and planning. Washington, DC: Island Press.
May, P. J. (1992). Policy learning and failure. Journal of Public Policy, 12(4), 331–354.
Platt, R. (1999). Disasters and democracy. Washington, DC: Island Press.
Sylves, R. T. (2015). Disaster policy and politics: Emergency management and Homeland
Security (2d ed.). Washington, DC: CQ Press.
Waugh W. L., Jr. (2007). Local emergency management in the post-9/11 world. In: W. L.
Waugh, Jr. & K. J. Tierney (Eds.), Emergency Management: Principles and Practice for Lo
cal Government (pp. 3–21). Washington, DC: ICMA Press.
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Baumgartner, F. R., & Jones, B. D. (2009). Agendas and instability in American politics (2d
ed). Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Birkland, T. A. (1997). After disaster: Agenda setting, public policy, and focusing events.
Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press.
Birkland, T. A. (1998). Focusing events, mobilization, and agenda setting. Journal of Pub
lic Policy, 18(1), 53–74.
Birkland, T. A. (2006). Lessons of disaster. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press.
Birkland, T. A., & Lawrence, R. G. (2009). Media framing and policy change after
Columbine. American Behavioral Scientist, 52(10), 1405–1425.
Clarke, L. (2002). Panic: Myth or reality. Contexts, 1(3), 21–26.
Cobb, R. W., & Elder, C. D. (1983). Participation in American politics: The dynamics of
agenda-building. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.
Cobb, R. W., & Ross, M. H. (1997). Cultural strategies of agenda denial: avoidance, at
tack, and redefinition. Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas.
Cohen, M. D., March, J. G., & Olsen, J. P. (1972). A garbage can model of organizational
choice. Administrative Science Quarterly, 17(1), 1–25.
Cooper, C., & Block, R. (2006). Disaster: Hurricane Katrina and the failure of Homeland
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deLeon, P. (1999). The stages approach to the policy process: What has it done? Where is
it going? In P. A. Sabatier (Ed.), Theories of the Policy Process (pp. 19–32). Boulder, CO:
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Easton, D. (1965). A systems analysis of political life. New York: Wiley.
Farley, J., Baker, D., Batker, D., Koliba, C., Matteson, R., Mills, R., et al. (2007). Opening
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nomics, 63(2–3), 344–354.
Gainsborough, J. F. (2009). Scandals, lawsuits, and politics: Child welfare policy in the U.
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Gerber, B. J. (2007). Disaster management in the United States: Examining key political
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M. Weible (Eds.), Theories of the policy process (3d ed.). Boulder, CO: Westview Press.
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Thomas A. Birkland
Department of Public Administration, North Carolina State University
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Policy Process Theory and Natural Hazards

Policy Process Theory and Natural Hazards

Summary and Keywords

date: 18 May 2020

date: 18 May 2020

Overview: Frameworks of the Policy Process

date: 18 May 2020

commonly perceived by members of the political community as meriting public attention

date: 18 May 2020

Kingdon’s multiple streams approach is an attempt to be a model of the policy process in

date: 18 May 2020

Before concluding this discussion, it is important to understand that Kingdon’s streams

Focusing Events in the Policy Process

This change opportunity is important, because, in Baumgartner and Jones’ punctuated

date: 18 May 2020

(Birkland, 1997, p. 22)

date: 18 May 2020

Focusing Events and Disaster Legislation in the United States, 1950

date: 18 May 2020

Table 1. Significant disaster legislation in the United States, 1950–

Year Legisla­ Related Event Summary

1950 Disaster Formalized existing prac­

1956 Federal Flood insurance program

1965 Flood Hurricane Betsy More fully engaged the

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1966 Disaster Alaska earth­ Amended 1950 act to al­

1968 National Hurricane Betsy, First flood insurance pro­

1969 Disaster Hurricane Debris removal, food aid,

1970 Disaster Hurricane Continues most provi­

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1973 Flood Dis­ Hurricane Agnes Expanded coverage; im­

1974 Disaster Hurricane Agnes Defined “major disasters”

1977 National 1964 Alaska and Bill enacted to address

1988 Robert T. No precipitating Amends Disaster Relief

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1993 Stafford Midwest floods of Amended the Stafford Act

2000 Disaster Hurricane Fran, Encourages state and lo­

2002 Home­ September 11 Made FEMA a part of the

2004 Flood In­ Indicator driven Provisions to encourage

2004 National Result of efforts Creates a National Wind­

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2006 Post-Kat­ Hurricane Katri­ Reestablished FEMA as a

2012 Biggert– Indicator-driven: Required flood insurance

2013 Disaster Hurricane Sandy Funds several federal

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2014 Home­ Indicator driven: Delayed implementation

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Variation in the Focal Power of Disasters

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(Perrow, 2008, p. 734)

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Disasters, Focusing Events, and Policy Learn­

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Figure 1. A model of event-related policy learning

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Birkland, T. A. (2006) Lessons of disaster. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press.

date: 18 May 2020

Platt, R. (1999). Disasters and democracy. Washington, DC: Island Press.

Birkland, T. A. (2006). Lessons of disaster. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press.

Clarke, L. (2002). Panic: Myth or reality. Contexts, 1(3), 21–26.

date: 18 May 2020

Easton, D. (1965). A systems analysis of political life. New York: Wiley.

Year Legisla Related Event Summary

1950 Disaster Formalized existing prac

1966 Disaster Alaska earth Amended 1950 act to al

1968 National Hurricane Betsy, First flood insurance pro

1970 Disaster Hurricane Continues most provi

1973 Flood Dis Hurricane Agnes Expanded coverage; im

2000 Disaster Hurricane Fran, Encourages state and lo

2002 Home September 11 Made FEMA a part of the

2004 Flood In Indicator driven Provisions to encourage

2004 National Result of efforts Creates a National Wind

2006 Post-Kat Hurricane Katri Reestablished FEMA as a

2014 Home Indicator driven: Delayed implementation

Disasters, Focusing Events, and Policy Learn