Exploring responses to geohazards in a dynamic risk environment - knowledge, narrative and risk perception in the Bailong River corridor

Landslides and debris flows are complex phenomena at the intersection of dynamic socio-ecological systems that affect millions of people around the world, causing loss of life, disruption of livelihoods and damage to infrastructure. Comprehensive understanding of the physical processes and mitigation strategies such as early warning systems have been developed by scientists and disaster managers.

Local residents also have knowledge and strategies about how to live with these hazards. Valuing and integrating both scientific and local knowledge is important for building a complete picture of the human-environment interactions that influence whether hazards become disasters. In addition,

recognising the risk perceptions and narratives that influence people’s actions and wider policy is vital.

Using the Vulnerability Analysis for Sustainability Science (VASS) framework (Turner, Kasperson et al., 2003), this study examines the socio-ecological system (SES) of the Bailong River corridor in Gansu Province, China, an area particularly affected by landslides and debris flows. Taking an interdisciplinary approach, it describes the human-environment interactions for a small tributary catchment case study and investigates how narratives and perceptions of risk vary between three social domains (scientists, disaster managers and local residents).

As a mixed methods study, photo-elicitation interviews with local residents, semi-structured interviews with scientists and disaster managers, geomorphological mapping, satellite image analysis, and document analysis were employed. Qualitative data were analysed using critical realist thematic

analysis to generate composite narratives of risk and themes describing the SES.

The study found that SES sensitivity is inherently place-based, revealed by local knowledge and involves a web of human-environment interactions, involving land, access and services, movement of people, culture, livelihoods and dwellings. Scientific knowledge contributes to understanding external influences at regional and global scale. In a centralised policy environment, there are few opportunities

for local place-based knowledge to inform disaster management decision-making. Definitions of terms such as risk and hazard vary, meaning that clarification is important, particularly in multilingual collaborations. Risk is an emergent property of an open, complex SES, requiring interdisciplinary investigation. Critical realism provides a suitable research philosophy capable of bringing together knowledge from different social domains and disciplines to better describe and understand the generative mechanisms of disaster risk.