Resilience in the Face of the Nature’s Furor: Natural Disasters and Vietnamese Households

Objective: This study aims to analyze the influence of natural disasters on countries' FDI.Method: We used data from 137 countries, considering the period from 2011 to 2017. The secondary data used to measure Foreign Direct Investment are from the UNCTAD - United Nations Conference on Trade and Development following the study by Alfaro et al. (2004). For data on natural disasters, the EM-DAT database - The International Disaster Database provided by CRED - Center for Research on the Epidemiology of Disasters - was used, based on the studies by Toya Skidmore (2007) and Escaleras Register (2011). The analysis was performed through Linear Regression of panel data.Originality/Relevance: This study points to a direction of research for those interested in expanding the flows of Foreign Direct Investment in their countries, being significant in the field of business, government, public policy makers and the third sector.Results: The results show that when an economy suffers from natural disasters that cause deaths and, consequently, a reduction in human capital, foreign investors can negatively portray this fact. On the other hand, the number of occurrences and the loss in millions of dollars when analyzed individually do not discourage FDI and the presence of multinationals in the affected country. The variables: total of injured, total of affected, and total of homeless have no relation with FDI in the analyzed sample. It is indicated that, in the face of a natural disaster, countries create opportunities for the replacement and reconstruction of infrastructure and human capital.Theoretical contribution: We seek to contribute theoretically to the recent increase of studies that verify the relationship between natural disasters and FDI in the light of the institution-based view. We direct greater understanding to the premise that natural disasters affect a country's economy as they cause FDI reduction, and we provide the foundation for future studies. While previous studies are concerned with FDI determinants, being tax incentives and property rights, this study focuses specifically on the different variables that aggregate natural disasters. In addition, the study aims to expand the perception of decision makers, belonging to the government, private entities and the third sector, so that they can reduce and prevent the occurrence of natural disasters, thus attracting FDI flows in their countries.

Download Full-text

Rochester's Flour-Milling Industry in Pre-Canal Days

The Business History Review ◽

10.2307/3111850 ◽

1957 ◽

Vol 31 (2) ◽

pp. 209-225

Author(s):

Edmond M. Beame

Keyword(s):

Natural Disasters ◽

Commodity Price ◽

Entrepreneurial Activity ◽

Water Access ◽

Local Growth ◽

Flour Milling ◽

Erie Canal ◽

National Market ◽

Rapid Sequence ◽

The Face

The early development of Rochester as a flour-milling center demonstrates several themes. Here, as in countless other places, the resiliency of the petty capitalist in the face of natural disasters and violent commodity price swings stands clear. But the early millers, flexible and energetic in entrepreneurial activity, were also, like their product, perishable. The broader and more important pattern is that of the persistence of an industry favored by basic geographic and market circumstances. Individual milk succumbed in rapid sequence, but rapidly they were replaced. Surviving the handicap of limited capital, the milling industry burst its heal bonds and exploited the regional potentialities of water access to Canada. Transition to what then amounted to a national market came in 1823, when the Erie Canal linked Rochester with the Hudson. Thus a new epoch was forecast, when a broadened market would not only stimulate local growth but shape it through complex economic influences hitherto little felt by the millers on the Genesee.

Download Full-text

Patterns for Achieving Resilience in Engineered and Organizational Systems

Multisystemic Resilience ◽

10.1093/oso/9780190095888.003.0036 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 682-702

Author(s):

Scott Jackson ◽

Victoria Hailey ◽

Keith D. Willett ◽

Timothy Ferris ◽

Eric A. Specking

Keyword(s):

Natural Disasters ◽

Power Grid ◽

Transportation Systems ◽

Terrorist Attacks ◽

Organizational Systems ◽

Grid Systems ◽

The Face ◽

Satisfactory State ◽

Prior State

This chapter examines how human-created systems in civil and organizational domains maintain their required capability to function effectively in the face of adversity and identifies the factors that enable these systems to remain resilient. Typical civil systems include power grid systems and transportation systems, such as aircraft. Organizational systems include enterprises and governments. Adversities include natural disasters and terrorist attacks. A recurring pattern in all domains is the ability to anticipate and prepare for adversity. Another recurring pattern is the ability for the system to adapt to the adversity. Some resilient systems can withstand adversity and then degrade gracefully to a satisfactory state, return to a prior state, or change to some new state. Both domains utilize a set of techniques to achieve resilience. These recurring patterns are common to both domains and are essential to the resilience of diverse systems.

Download Full-text

Introduction: Urban Resilience Efforts in the Face of Natural Disasters

Cities at Risk ◽

10.4324/9781315572109-5 ◽

2016 ◽

pp. 17-30

Keyword(s):

Natural Disasters ◽

Urban Resilience ◽

The Face

Download Full-text

Applying the perceived probability of risk and bias toward optimism: Implications for travel decisions in the face of natural disasters

Tourism Management ◽

10.1016/j.tourman.2017.09.013 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 66 ◽

pp. 221-232 ◽

Cited By ~ 10

Author(s):

Bongkosh Rittichainuwat ◽

Robert Nelson ◽

Fitri Rahmafitria

Keyword(s):

Natural Disasters ◽

The Face ◽

Travel Decisions ◽

Perceived Probability

Download Full-text

Human suffering and tragic contradictions in Amechi Akwanya’s Pilgrim Foot

The Journal of Commonwealth Literature ◽

10.1177/0021989420960508 ◽

2020 ◽

pp. 002198942096050

Author(s):

Abba A. Abba

Keyword(s):

Natural Disasters ◽

Human Suffering ◽

Central Theme ◽

Divine Love ◽

Critical Attention ◽

The Face ◽

The Cross

Nigerian poet Amechi Akwanya’s Pilgrim Foot: A Collection of Poems (2005) has not received much critical attention. This is despite the collection’s important poetic meditation on human suffering, a subject that has troubled the imagination since time immemorial. Although scholars have read the central theme of the first sequence of this collection as man’s dispossession by his creator, its illumination of man’s confrontation with the tragic contradiction evident in human suffering has largely been ignored. Florence Orabueze (2015), for instance, has argued that Akwanya deploys the symbolism of the cross to signify man’s endless suffering in the face of natural disasters, suggesting that the search for freedom from these sufferings always ends in futility. Seeking to extend this argument, and relying on theoretical strategies drawn from the study of tragedy, this article examines the first sequence of Akwanya’s Pilgrim Foot: A Collection of Poems. I argue that the sequence belongs to the realm of tragic poetry, which interrogates man’s confrontation with suffering and the tragic contradiction that surrounds the celebrated myth of divine love for humanity.

Download Full-text