Disaster Recovery Management in Australia and the Contribution of Social Work

Abstract

This article describes Australia's broad disaster recovery planning and management approach, adopting a social and community recovery perspective. The role of social work in Australian disaster recovery management is discussed, and its increasing assertion and maturation of practice. Theoretical underpinnings include trauma, grief, and crisis intervention. Strengths-based, solution-focused approaches to intervention, and a sound understanding of community development principles, are essential to facilitating community recovery. Two examples (flood and bushfire) illustrate the full spectrum of planning, immediate psychosocial response, and longer term community and individual recovery. Issues such as effective multiagency practice, individual case management, and consideration of vulnerable groups are highlighted.

KEYWORDS:

• Australian disaster recovery arrangements
• Australian natural disasters
• community recovery
• disaster management policy
• disaster planning
• disaster recovery
• disaster resilience
• social work

Acknowledgments

Thanks go to Heather Peasley for her critical comments on an earlier draft of this article.

Notes

Note. Individual and community responses are mediated by individual perception, belief, experience, local history, and experience within the community, and credibility of the emergency or recovery agency. Adapted from Drabek (1986), Raphael (1986), and Emergency Management Australia (2004).

These payments are currently AU$1,000 per eligible adult and AU$400 per eligible child under 16.

Centrelink provides services and payments on behalf of a number of federal government departments. It employs approximately 25,000 staff, including approximately 650 social workers, across Australia, working in metropolitan, regional, and remote locations.

The sources of data for this section are unpublished government reports by the NSW Department of Community Services (2007) and the NSW Department of Premier and Cabinet (2007), as well as the author's reports to the NSW Department of Community Services (Rowlands, 2007b). All dollar amounts are in Australian dollars.

Elvis is the name given to water-bombing helicopters used to fight bushfires.