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There is no doubt in the notion that the hurricane itself could not have been prevented, but the devastation could have been reduced if the social and environmental events have questioned the political responses from the government. As a natural disaster, if we analyze the initial responses to the hurricane, it is evident that government-provided sympathies for the communities who had been randomly struck by an event beyond human control. Sympathies alone are not what was expected by the flood-devastated New Orleans, as a response to ruined homes, shattered bodies, disposed of families, and temporary shelters. There has always been a need to address the causes behind the government’s inability to control the disaster. Such a concern is deeply embedded in our minds that have shifted our attention from one natural disaster to that of governmental failure (Whitehead & Jones, 2007, p. 3). This paper will analyze the various cause and effects of governmental inefficiencies in addressing the ways that could have been used in preventing such a situation which left millions of Americans in pain.
Sketches portrayed by critics reveal images of poor flood victims in New Orleans that suffered at the hands of the unresponsive federal government. The onus has been put on the mayor, the Louisiana governor, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, and the President (Haulman, 2007). In the wake of numerous analyses made by public bodies, journalists, professional associations, and scientists of what went wrong in rescue and relief operations after Hurricane Katrina, it is evident that most of the critiques examined the shortcomings of government agencies and offices at all levels and arrived at a conclusion where they discovered a set of problems. Scientists associate the hurricane with two phases. One phase reckons the deficiencies and blames the command and control problems to be responsible for the devastation. This includes according to Krane (2007) “inadequate communication, coordination, equipment, infrastructure design, individual and organizational initiative, leadership, management, mission clarity, planning, shelter, supplies, transportation, and training” (Krane, 2007). However, the second phase identifies administrative and technical failures and sees class-based differences, racism, and political culture through the lens of politics. Many believe that it is this political stance responsible for the delay in the recovery phase. Krane (2007) suggests that since efforts made to remedy the errors in response to Katrina cannot pretend, as some analyses and recommendations have, that the pursuit of political advantage somehow will be suspended.
The response to Hurricane Katrina has raised many concerns in our minds that question the ineffectiveness played on part of the government agencies like disaster management and the US Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). Therefore besides the failure of situational awareness, the answer to this natural disaster lies not in the improper handling of the operations, but it seeks to address the incompetent structure of the governmental response system designed to combat the nature of the disaster. Government response depends upon the perception on which the natural disaster has been felt by the public and is in alliance with the governmental expectations and planning. If the government plans and develops public organizations to perform standard operating procedures and routine policies, then institutionalized processes are supposed to address every possible contingency.
In the case of Hurricane Katrina, bureaucratic norms that were supposed to provide the establishment for the governmental response system not only generated difficult conditions, but also such norms institutionalized patterns of behavior that simply did not seem to apply. This is evident from what politicians aimed at taking necessary steps so as to protect New Orleans, which is already a below-sea-level city.
Disasters are a part of natural and social processes and they happen. However, in the case of New Orleans, one can easily indicate they could have been prevented if governmental policies were not long-run to value growth over security (Watkins, 2007). In other words, the situation could not have been worst if the affluent and middle class were not suppressed over the poor. The long-run ineffective policy of protecting New Orleans presents a paradox in making effort to protect New Orleans. This way government provides a false sense of security, creating and leaving the gap for the potential for a much larger disaster. Particularly, when scientists were in the process of predicting that disaster long ago, it was the responsibility of the government to prevent the people from the catastrophe.
Government response to the scientific community represents a disregard for constant warnings which the then political parties received to avoid undesirable choices. However, in the wake of new developments that on one hand created obvious benefits, on the other such developmental policies reinforced barriers in the way to pursue beneficial short-term policies. It was when the House Select Committee investigated the response to Katrina, found a number of problems that escorted to the failure in providing a complete evacuation of New Orleans. Other failures that Watkins (2007) mentions in considering government’s ineffectiveness include the failure to execute the National Response Plan in designating a ‘Principal Federal Official’ to oversee the federal response, communication barriers, inadequate preparation on the part of the Department of Homeland Security and the states, failure to maintain law and order enforcement, lack of medical preparation and, failure of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to house and provide for large numbers of people for a period of time (Watkins, 2007).
Disaster recoveries encompass several phases of which a public manager is well aware of. Behind the implementation of public programs that include disaster relief and reconstruction stages, are political parties that excel bald-faced political leanings. Hurricane Katrina is the best example of how inadequately implementation has taken place to assemble recovery program elements. In this, the politics have failed to move them through multiple bureaucratic-political layers to deliver effective goods and services to intended citizen beneficiaries (Krane, 2007).
As far as the policies are concerned, whether it is environmental decisions or political sweep over, policies are directly linked with political decisions that do not stop with the adoption of a particular program. Unless implemented at the grass-root level, policies are solely characterized by rational technical decisions which are dependant upon the democratic turnovers. Therefore, instead of putting blames on one another shoulders, the various stakeholders who asserted over the unprofessional political wrestling, had shown its execution by the mutual collaboration of other political parties, the situation could not have been worst. A senior Corps official when stated that “The design was not adequate to protect against a storm of this nature because we were not authorized to provide a Category Four or Five protection design” (Hirschhorn, 2010). Such a statement itself provides evidence against the political jockeying behind the steps taken by the government, which put at stake the lives of millions of Americans in the wake of the Katrina catastrophe. What the public deserved after the hurricane was an immediate monetary recovery which was lacked by the Bush administration. According to Hirschhorn, “Hurricane Katrina did not destroy New Orleans as much as bad politicians and bureaucratic bungling did and it would not be wrong to say that nature only throws hazards, people turn them into disasters” (Hirschhorn, 2010).
Ineffective policies not only created barriers in doing justice to the criminal legislature but also created masses of practical limitations that negatively reshaped structural systems as deficiencies in the criminal legislature. Even if we talk about before the hurricane, it is evident that New Orleans was acquired by hunger and shattered homes, where a new record for failing to provide basic security measures was formed. (Garrett & Tetlow, 2006).
The failure of the US government in providing adequate and quick response to the Katrina disaster highlights the widening gap between state bureaucracies and nature. The bureaucratic political infrastructures serve as the hindrance in letting states dealing with the power of the natural world effectively. The administrative structures of the modern-day world provide the means to realize the power and influence of the state (Whitehead & Jones, 2007, p. 4). In relation to combat natural hazards, modern states have developed a range of specialist administrative structures to manage and protect the citizens from the natural world. However, despite possessing administrative power and the consent of political authorities, how strange it is that advanced nations like the US still lack the ability to combat the anger of Mother Nature.
References
Garrett L. Brandon & Tetlow, Tania. (2006). Criminal Justice Collapse: The Constitution after Hurricane Katrina Duke Law Journal 56: 1. 127.
Haulman L. Daniel. (2007). The U.S. Air Force Response to Hurricane Katrina. Air Power History 54: 3. 40.
Hirschhorn, S. Joel. 2010. Web.
Krane Dale. (2007). The Unavoidable Politics of Disaster Recovery: Hurricane Katrina Offers Lessons on the Interaction of Technical Matters with Decisions That Distribute Benefits and Burdens. The Public Manager. 36: 3. 31.
Watkins, P. John. (2007). Economic Institutions under Disaster Situations: The Case of Hurricane Katrina. Journal of Economic Issues. 41: 2. 477.
Whitehead Mark, Jones Rhys & Jones Martin. (2007). The Nature of the State: Excavating the Political Ecologies of the Modern State: Oxford University Press: New York.
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