Disasters
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This paper employs a three-element model to examine how the disaster rescue system of the government of Nantou County in Middle Taiwan functioned following the earthquake of 21 September 1999. The three elements are information gathering, local government mobilisation, and inter-organisational cooperation. The paper finds that the Nantou County government needs to address many problems associated with these three elements. ⋯ Insufficient information caused ineffectiveness in the realms of mobilisation and inter-organisational cooperation. As for mobilisation, while the Nantou County magistrate successfully used specific information to encourage flows of huge resources in the county, he did not successfully mobilise human resources there. With regard to inter-organisational cooperation, myriad voluntary actors and international rescue teams travelled to Nantou County, but the fire and police services experienced cooperation and coordination problems.
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The modern cast of disaster relief actors includes host nations, non-governmental organisations, private volunteer organisations, military organisations and others. Each group, civilian or military, has valuable skills and experiences critical to disaster relief work. The goal of this paper is to supplement the study of civil-military relief efforts with contemporary anecdotal experience. ⋯ The author uses direct observations made while working in Pakistan to contrast the relationships and activities from that effort with other accounts in prevailing scholarly disaster literature and military doctrine. Finally, this paper suggests that the Kashmir model of integration, coordination and transparency of intent creates a framework in which future humanitarian assistance operations could be successfully executed. Recommendations to improve civil-military interaction in future relief efforts will also be addressed.