An Analysis of Issues for the Management of Post-Disaster Housing Reconstruction

Abstract

There is an urgent need to improve the management of housing reconstruction programmes. Post-disaster housing reconstruction represents a significant portion of global property investment but its management has often proved to be ineffective. Although the post-disaster context makes management more challenging, it also offers exceptional opportunities to invest in and develop a more resilient built environment. On the basis of a systematic review of the existing literature, characteristics of the housing reconstruction context and successes, failures and management issues arising from historical housing reconstruction programmes were identified. These were synthesized into a conceptual framework that relates the contextual characteristics with management strategies and with the desired outcomes for housing reconstruction initiatives. This framework will enable field data collection in order to better understand the interrelationships between context, management strategies and outcomes. Ultimately, it is intended to provide practitioners with decision support tools for selecting appropriate housing reconstruction management strategies.

Factors Influencing Post-disaster Reconstruction Project Management for Housing Provision in the Gaza Strip, Occupied Palestinian Territories

“…A range of scholars have investigated the numerous factors that come into play and exert a positive or negative influence on PDRPM for housing provision (Moe and Pathranarakul 2006;Chang et al 2010Chang et al , 2011Hidayat and Egbu 2010;Ismail et al 2014;Bilau and Witt 2016;Bilau et al 2017). For the purpose of this article, six principal groups of factors that influence PDRPM for housing provision were identified (Fig.…”

“…In post-disaster reconstruction, several housing approaches can be adopted, and differ markedly from routine construction (Lizarralde et al 2009;Jha et al 2010;Bilau and Witt 2016). The most suitable approach should be locally assessed and principally relates to the degree of household control over the project.…”

“…Success or failure depends on a complex set of challenges and opportunities that arise in terms of resource access and availability, logistics and material availability, labor issues, as well as communities' involvement or empowerment (Davidson et al 2007;Lizarralde et al 2009;Chang et al 2010;Ophiyandri et al 2013;Ismail et al 2014;Bilau and Witt 2016;Seneviratne et al 2016;Bilau et al 2017). …”

“…The influx of funding to a location may also cause local price inflation. These issues can lead to compromises in housing provision, often regarding efficiency and quality of the process and the final product (Bilau and Witt 2016). Therefore, funding constraints represent a significant challenge to implementing organizations.…”

Analysis of Measures for Managing Issues in Post-Disaster Housing Reconstruction

“…In conducting this study, a systematic literature search was conducted on six (6) selected electronic databases to collect journal articles, conference proceedings and case study reports on housing reconstruction programmes [18]. The databases were selected to ensure a wide collection of peer-reviewed literature.…”