The correlations between livelihood capitals and perceived recovery: A longitudinal study in China after the 2008 Wenchuan earthquake
Disaster Prevention and Management
ISSN: 0965-3562
Article publication date: 4 March 2020
Issue publication date: 12 March 2021
Abstract
Purpose
This study examines the recovery of households after disasters from the sustainable livelihood approach (SLA) perspective.
Design/methodology/approach
This study analyzes the perception of recovery by using a longitudinal household survey data set collected from a Chinese county devastated by the 2008 Wenchuan earthquake. The analysis compares the changes of livelihood capitals (financial, natural, physical, social, human) between 2012 and 2009 and recovery perception.
Findings
The results demonstrate that both the current status of financial, natural, and social capital and the changes of the capitals between 2009 and 2012 are positively correlated with the perceived level of recovery. The associations between the current status and the change of physical capital and recovery perception are insignificant. In contrast, with a greater change of human capital between 2009 and 2012, participants have a lower perception of recovery.
Originality/value
By investigating a longitudinal data, this study indicates that (1) household recovery should be considered as multidimensional, (2) the SLA could be a feasible framework to measure recovery, and (3) individual's recovery perception is dependent on the various dimensions of recovery measures.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
This study is funded by National Social Science Foundation of China “The Study of Modes of Wenchuan earthquake recovery and sustainable development (2008–2018)” (No. 17ASH007); Shenzhen Social Science Research Grant (SZ2019B016) and Beijing Normal University Think Tank Project “Researches on disaster prevention, reduction and relief and coping with disaster modernization”.
Citation
Han, Z., Wang, L. and Wei, J. (2021), "The correlations between livelihood capitals and perceived recovery: A longitudinal study in China after the 2008 Wenchuan earthquake", Disaster Prevention and Management, Vol. 30 No. 2, pp. 194-208. https://doi.org/10.1108/DPM-08-2019-0237
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
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