Disaster and Social Work in Nepal: A Discussion

Abstract

Despite social work’s about three decades of history and most populations being at risk of multiple natural disasters, Nepali social workers are yet to establish their foothold in the sector of disaster in Nepal. Part of this has happened due to ineffective curriculum on disaster and social work. And hence, this article proposes how the curriculum for disaster and social work can be advanced in the future.

Introduction

Nepal is one of the most vulnerable nations to natural disasters (hereafter disaster/s) in the world. Most Nepali people are exposed to risks of disasters that include earthquakes, droughts, landslides, extreme weather conditions and glacier lake outbursts (Ministry of Home Affairs, 2017). As shown in Tables 1 and 2, Nepal recorded a total of 43,731 disasters events between 1971 and 2021. Nepali government introduced its first policy framework to deal with disasters in 1981 and since then such policies and legal frameworks have continued to grow, and meantime, these have been regularly reviewed and amended. Furthermore, numerous national and international non-government organisations’ involvement in disaster fields compliments the government’s efforts to deal with disasters in Nepal (see Table 4). Why then Nepali social work with its almost three decades of history is yet to establish its foothold in the fields of disaster in Nepal? Part of this has happened due to an ineffective curriculum on disaster and social work in Nepal. And hence, this article explores the ways disaster and social work curriculum can be advanced in the future in Nepal.

Globally social work has played significant roles in disasters management and Nepali social workers, too, can do the same. As elsewhere, Nepali social workers can contribute to disaster management—preparedness, rescue, mitigation and rehabilitation. In particular, given the various discriminations, inequalities and injustices undergirding the Nepali nation (Yadav, 2019) that furthermore exacerbate disaster situations and disproportionately affect those who are poor, women, children, older adults, so-called low caste and ethnic groups, and live in the remotest regions of the country (Aryal, 2014; Hülssiep et al., 2021), Nepali social workers have significant roles to play in disaster justice. They can represent the voiceless, marginalised and underprivileged groups and communities; and in doing so, they can also advocate for just and sustainable disaster-related policies and practices in Nepal. Nevertheless, to do so, first and foremost, Nepali social workers will have to re-visit disaster-related curriculums and adjust and advance them accordingly.

Hence, building on theoretical concepts, policy documents, qualitative and quantitative analyses and existing literatures in disaster and social work, this article provides a preliminary discussion on how Nepali social work can contribute to the fields of disaster by advancing its education, especially its curriculums. Given the main subject-matter of this article is relatively underexplored, the goal here is to draw on various sources and then synthesise them to suggest how the idea of disaster and social work can be strengthened in the future rather than appraise the existing literature or produce a theory.

The first three sections of the article—understanding disaster, overview of disasters and disaster governance—set the context for this article. This article then assesses social work vis-à-vis disasters in Nepal. This section in particular explores social work curriculums on disaster offered by the various Nepali universities. And, in the end, the article outlines strategies for how Nepali social work education in relation to disasters can be strengthened and advanced in the future.

Insights thus produced by this article will not only initiate a new debate but also will equip Nepali social workers with relevant knowledge to effectively design and develop disaster and social work education in Nepal. It will furthermore also help Nepali social work graduates to establish their foothold in disaster sector in Nepal. Worth to mention, such insights may benefit similar contexts elsewhere.

From the onset, it is essential to clarify that the premise of this article is not to ignore individual scholarships, contributions and engagements in this area in Nepal. Scholarships and engagements in this area are emerging (see, for instance, Nikku, 2015; Dominelli, 2018; Madhanagopal et al., 2022); however, these have not yielded a desired outcome in terms of disaster and social work education in Nepal. And therefore, the need for a systematic exploration of this topic here.

Disaster understanding, paradigms and roles of social workers

The study of disaster is not a new phenomenon in social work. A plethora of research and theoretical perspectives inform the idea of disaster and social work (Ungar, 2002). However, given that disaster and social work education is being first time systematically explored in Nepal, it is important here to define and clarify the term disaster from the onset. Also, worth noting, there has been no one specific definition that explains disaster wholly (Park, 2016). Varied societal values, cultures, religious beliefs and people’s daily experiences assign different meanings and understanding to the term disaster (Eshghi and Larson, 2008; Park, 2016). In other words, disaster evokes different understanding and interpretation in different contexts.

The meaning of disaster has shifted from a traditional understanding of a bad star causing catastrophes (Eshghi and Larson, 2008) to a broader understanding of an adverse event or series of events that cause loss of lives, serious injuries and bring unexpected changes in economic, political, psychological and social structures of disaster-stricken societies (Furedi, 2007). In general, disaster has been understood as,

… a serious disruption of the functioning of a society, causing widespread human, material, or environmental losses which exceed the ability of affected society to cope using only its own resources. (Reuter and Kaufhold, 2018, p. 2)

Universally disaster has been categorised as natural and manmade disasters (Eshghi and Larson, 2008; Nobles, 2013; Halkos et al., 2015). The former category includes adverse events that result from the earth’s natural processes, such as earthquakes, floods, volcanoes, landslides, tsunamis and other geological processes. Whereas the latter is the result of human activities and includes arson, terrorism, war and chemical threats (Eshghi and Larson, 2008; Nobles, 2013; Halkos et al., 2015). This article focuses on natural disasters.

As shown in Figure 1, there have been co-existing paradigms in understanding the concept of disaster and its scope that include: (i) Religious perspective, (ii) scientific perspective, (iii) ecological perspective and (iv) social psychological perspective (Furedi, 2007). More recently, the idea of justice has been added as a new, emerging paradigm to understand and manage disasters (see, for instance, Jerolleman, 2019; Lukasiewicz, 2020; Alston and Chow, 2021). Each of these perspectives has been briefly discussed below:

• Religious perspective: From a religious perspective, disaster has been attributed to the supernatural, characterised as an Act of God, implying that it is beyond human’s control, and nothing can be done (Davis et al., 2019).

• Scientific perspective: With the rise in Enlightenment secularism and subsequently the development of science has led to a shift to understand disaster as an Act of Nature; and therefore, there should be a systematic scientific approach to study disaster and its impacts.

• Ecological perspective: Shifting away from the previous two perspectives, the ecological perspective links disaster to an extreme environment, such as the worsening of climate change.

• Social psychological perspective: On contrary to detrimental effects of disaster, a handful of scholars (Britton, 1986; Vitaliano et al., 1987; Furedi, 2007) have studied disaster from a social psychological perspective; and thus, they claim that an event of disaster helps the victims to revive and practice a sense of solidarity and mutual helpfulness. Under this perspective, it is furthermore argued that the social impact of disaster is not purely negative. Rather, in some cases, disaster may be an opportunity benefiting the survivors to rejuvenate their relationship in their communities.

• Mental health perspective: The emphasis has shifted from the community to an individual’s psychological state concerning how the disaster impacts an individual's overall functioning and makes him/her vulnerable in the aftermath of a disaster.

• Disaster justice perspective: Although the concept of justice is complex, fragmented and interdisciplinary, research to justice is rare (Lukasiewicz, 2020), many have begun to utilise justice concept in understanding and managing disasters. Its use in disasters seeks to frame disasters management as the issue of human rights and furthermore concerns to inclusive decision-making process, free of discrimination and fair treatment of all people in policies and programmes relevant to disasters. Within this paradigm, the intention is also to pay attention to risks of disasters that disproportionately affect already vulnerable and socially disadvantaged populations.

Globally social work has embraced the above understandings in one or another way when it engages with disasters interventions. And, in doing so, although invisible and unrecognised (Alston and Chow, 2021), it has played varied roles, as well as its functions and services have been crucial at all levels of disaster interventions. For instance, drawing on an experience from earthquake in Taiwan Chou (2003) found that social workers’ role was significant at micro level to rescue the victims in the aftermath of disasters. Kamrujjaman et al. (2018) similarly outlined that social workers were engaged in mobilising resources and distributing relief at the time of flood disaster in Indonesia. Building on secondary sources from Bangladesh, Hossain (2013) noted that social workers’ roles were vital to enhance community participation and support the most vulnerable and marginalised populations at meso level. And likewise, Dickson et al. (2022) reported from Zimbabwe that social work’s macro-level engagement involved disasters planning and advocacy for disaster justice.

An overview of disasters in Nepal

Nepal, a landlocked country sandwiched between China and India, is a disaster-prone country (Center for Excellence in Disaster Management and Humanitarian Assistance, 2017; Aksha and Emrich, 2020). With variant geographical altitudes from 59 to 8,848 m, changing climatic conditions and an active seismic zone (Aksha and Emrich, 2020), on average, Nepal faces about 593 natural disasters claiming 993 lives each year (Shrestha, 2019). It ranks 20th among countries prone to multiple hazards, 4th and 11th for climate change and earthquakes respectively (Center for Excellence in Disaster Management and Humanitarian Assistance, 2017; Shrestha, 2019). Nepal also ranks 30th amongst the flood-affected countries in the world. Heavy monsoons, fragile landscapes, most people’s lower socio-economic statuses and unstable political circumstances furthermore exacerbate the impacts of disasters in Nepal.

The country is divided into three main geographical regions hills, mountains and Terai which cover 41.7 per cent, 35.2 per cent and 23.1 per cent of Nepali land respectively (Chhetry, 2001). Nepali Himalayan range occupies one-third of the world’s Himalaya and gives birth to approximately 6,000 rivers that flow from the north to the south in the country (Ministry of Home Affairs, 2018). Although water-related disasters mainly floods and landslides are common to all three regions and affect most families, each region faces different types of disasters (Ministry of Home Affairs, 2018). For instance, avalanches and snowstorms are more common in the Himalayas, whereas landslides often happen in the mountains, and cold waves and floods are common in the Terai region. Earthquakes, forest fires, hailstorms, heavy rains and thunderbolts are common to all regions of the country (Ministry of Home Affairs, 2017). The impacts of these disasters are so severe that about 4,344 lost their lives due to floods between 1971 and 2015, and likewise a total of 2,780 landslides occurred between 1971 and 2011 that took 3,302 Nepali lives (Shrestha, 2019). The decade-wise data between 1900 and 2005 and likewise common types of disaster and their overall impacts in Nepal between 1971 and 2012 and 2013 and 2021 have been recorded in Tables 1 and 2, respectively.

Earthquake and floods: two major types of disasters and their impacts in Nepal

Earthquakes of 1934, 1988 and 2015

Nepal is an earthquake-prone country that recorded twenty-one earthquakes between 1255 and 2015 (Chaulagain et al., 2018). Out of these, three major earthquakes struck the country in the past 88 years, in 1934, 1988 and 2015 that affected millions of Nepali people and caused them to lose their lives and properties (see Table 3). These earthquakes also added economic losses furthermore making already poor country to poorer. The earthquake of 1934, with its epicentre near Kathmandu Valley, was measured at 8.4 Richter Scale that affected Nepal and some parts of India. About 8,000 Nepali people lost their lives due to the 1934 earthquake. Likewise, the earthquake of 1988 with its epicentre in the Udayapur district and of 6.7 Richter Scale affected thirty-three out of seventy-five districts of that time in Nepal. About a half million people were affected and of them about 721 lost their lives. Over a hundred thousand houses were damaged due to this earthquake. More recently, in 2015, two earthquakes struck Nepal 17 days apart. It affected approximately eight million Nepali people. Out of seventy-seven districts, forty-five were affected and around eight thousand Nepali people died. The country’s economic loss due to two earthquakes in 2015 was estimated to be approximately USD 97,426,000 (Center for Excellence in Disaster Management and Humanitarian Assistance, 2017).

Floods in Nepal

Nepal faces severe flooding that affects an average of 27,654 families, and due to this, around 309 people have to lose their lives each year (Baral, 2009). Historical data recorded between 1971 and 2012 indicates that floods affected 52,160 households and claimed 722 lives. Moreover, between 2013 and 2021 the number of affected households and loss of lives due to flooding increased to 120,425 and 12,719, respectively. Economic loss due to flood has been equivalent to USD 293,445,923.7 between 2013 and 2021, which is almost double the period between 1971 and 2012 (Baral, 2009; Ministry of Home Affairs, 2018).

The 2008 Koshi flood, considered to be one of the worst disasters in the past five decades, took 40 lives, injured 2,350 people, completely damaged 6,183 houses and displaced 7,558 families. Approximately 5,500 people had to be rescued at that time (Baral, 2009; Ministry of Home Affairs, 2011). The same flood caused the death of 14,500 domestic animals and damaged foodstuffs, roads and public buildings.

Disaster governance in Nepal

The term disaster governance is of recent origin and yet is so vital to social work and disaster concepts. In its simpler sense, the term disaster governance refers to ‘the system of institutions, mechanisms, policy and legal frameworks and other arrangements to guide, coordinate and oversee disaster risk reduction and related areas of policy’ (United Nations Disaster Risk Reduction, n.d., n.p.). It, in a broader sense, refers to,

… interrelated sets of norms, organizational and institutional actors, and practices (spanning pre-disaster, trans-disaster, and post-disaster periods) that are designed to reduce the impacts and losses associated with disaster… (Tierney, 2012, p. 344)

Several scholars, for instance Alston and Chow (2021) and Rambaree and Rambaree (2021), have argued that social workers are key actors in disaster governance. In collaboration with other actors, institutions—both public and private, systems and frameworks, civil society and community, Nepali social workers can effectively participate, contribute and strengthen disaster governance; and, in doing so, can also minimise the risks and vulnerabilities resulting from disasters in Nepal. Although social work knowledge and its engagement in disaster in Nepal have begun to evolve (Madhanagopal et al., 2022), as Alston et al. (2019) noted elsewhere, without a proper understanding of the context of disaster governance, Nepali social workers might feel alien and may even hesitate to participate in the field of disaster in the future. Thus, this section explores the emerging paradigms of disaster governance and actors involved in it in Nepal.

Disaster governance paradigms, as Vij et al. (2020) argued, are emerging in nature and have gone through four stages that include: (i) Disaster response and recovery (1982—ongoing), (ii) disaster risk reduction (1997—ongoing), (iii) integrated climate change adaption and disaster risk reduction (2007—ongoing) and (iv) federalised disaster risk reduction (2015—ongoing). In its beginning, Nepali disaster governance emphasised responses and recovery in the aftermath of disasters. Since 1997 it has added integrated climate change adaption and disaster risk reduction. In more recent times, given the Nepali state’s adoption of the federal system, disaster governance has adopted federalised disaster risk reduction.

Despite such development, Nepali social workers are yet to engage themselves in the field of disaster including in disaster governance. The Government of Nepal is yet to recognise social work as a profession. The non-government organisations where most social work graduates work do not offer a social work designation. And, until now, Nepal has neither an accredited body for social work education nor an inclusive, formal association of social workers, which furthermore have impacted the overall profession and social work education including disaster and social work.

The current systems of disaster governance in Nepal constitute various government bodies and their plans, policies and strategies. There are national and international non-government development agencies, international government agencies, the United Nations agencies and bilateral and multilateral agencies that have contributed to disaster governance in Nepal (see Table 4). Given the dearth of studies in the area of social work and disaster in Nepal, as well as lacking formal recording system of Nepali social workers, it is until now unclear how do Nepali social workers engage themselves with those agencies and respond to disasters. However, based on one of the authors’ individual experiences of working with such agencies in the past in Nepal; and also, as few literatures affirm, it can be said that social work graduates are involved in these agencies (Yadav, 2019; Larmar et al., 2021) and respond to disasters, but they have different designations other than social workers. Their positions vary from programme coordinators to programme officers, and sometimes, even include monitoring and evaluation officers. Depending on the positions that they hold and the nature of organisations where they work, their engagements range from disaster preparedness, reduction, response, recovery, reporting and monitoring and evaluation of disaster-related programmes. Worth noting here, it is a development perspective, not the social work one, that informs their disaster-related work in those agencies.

Amongst the government bodies, the Ministry of Home Affairs is a key government body that plans and implements disaster-related activities and policies and partners with national and international bodies to address the issue of disaster in Nepal. As shown in Table 4, Nepal’s disaster-related policy began in the early 1980s, and since then, policies have continued to emerge. The most recent and notable policy, the Disaster Risk Reduction National Strategic Plan of Action 2018–2030, aims to build a safer, adaptive and resilient Nepali nation by preventing disasters and their risks. It also emphasises preparedness and resilience to deal with disasters in the future.

Alongside government bodies and their policy frameworks, there are several domestic and international non-government organisations, as well as the United Nations, bilateral, and multilateral agencies that contribute to the disaster governance in Nepal. While most international non-government organisations and multilateral and bilateral agencies participate in policy and funding support to the Nepali government, the local non-government organisations complement to government by implementing its policies at the community level. Informal community-led responses to trans-disaster and post-disaster are historical and cultural practices in Nepal. In recent years, due to the Nepali government’s recognition of the community in its disaster-related policies, as well as the formal launch of community-based disaster management under the initiative of the United Nations Development Program and the National Society for Earthquake Technology-Nepal, it is expected that communities will become one of the significant actors in disaster governance in the future in Nepal (Pandey, 2019).

Despite the emerging paradigm of disaster and various actors involved in disaster governance, few critics, for instance, Jones et al. (2014), argued that disaster governance is ineffective in Nepal. It is so inter alia due to the Nepali state’s weak apparatus, unstable political environment and competing interests of the government and national and international non-government organisations (Jones et al., 2014). Given this, Nepali social workers have a great potential to address the existing issues in disaster governance in Nepal. However, to do so, first they need to have comprehensive understanding of disaster; and meantime, they should be well equipped with knowledge, skills and research techniques in relation to social work and disaster.

Social work and disaster in Nepal

Globally, professional social workers have engaged themselves in disaster responses and managements. Whether there were earthquakes in Latin America (Kennedy, 1971), Indonesia (Laksmono et al., 2008) and China (Nikku, 2015), hurricanes in the USA (Hawkins and Maurer, 2009), droughts and fires in Australia (Alston et al., 2016), floods across Asia (Alston et al., 2019) or rising sea level in the Pacific (Tascón and Ife, 2019), social workers have responded to these disasters in one or another way. In general, the focus of social work in response to disaster pivots around four key themes: (i) interventions relating to psychological care, aid work and community work during a disaster, (ii) understanding the effects of disasters on people and social workers as a mediator to address these effects, (iii) constructing effective social work education and practice in relation to disaster and subsequently managing disaster-related challenges and (iv) continuous development of research in social work and disaster (Cleary and Dominelli, 2020). In other words, disaster has become a significant field of social work, and this continues to evolve globally even today.

However, the idea of disaster and social work is developing at snail pace in Nepal. Nepali social work has about a three-decade-long history that proliferated from one social work institute in 1996 affiliated with Kathmandu University to currently five universities and more than sixty affiliated public and private colleges. Currently, Nepal offers four levels of social work education programmes—Training in Social Work, Bachelor of Social Work/Bachelor of Arts in Social Work, Master of Social Work and Doctorates in Social Work. These programmes offer various courses to Nepali students that range from methods of social work to community development, understanding of Nepali society, policy engagements and conflict management and peacebuilding. Despite the criticisms abound (Ghimire et al., 2024; Yadav, 2019, 2023), it is reasonably convincing that some of the curriculums offered are relevant to the Nepali context. Nevertheless, a significant progress is yet to be attained when it comes to disaster and social work in Nepal. Especially, disaster-related social work curriculums are still ineffective that furthermore do not sufficiently equip social work graduates with relevant knowledge and skills to work with disaster sector in Nepal. The lack of agreed upon or coherent curriculum of social work across social work higher education institutions in Nepal is one of the key reasons for this.

As highlighted in Table 5, three out of five universities offer disaster-related courses. Purbanchal University offers disaster-related courses at its both bachelor and master levels; however, it is yet to develop full-fledged curriculum for its master level. Kathmandu University and Tribhuwan University offer such courses at their bachelor and master levels respectively. Although Mid-Western University offers both bachelor and master levels of social work programmes, it does not offer any specific course on disaster. The key contents of this course pivot around understanding disaster, its management, and international case studies of disaster. Integration of these courses in social work programmes is praiseworthy, which furthermore offers hope that the field of disaster and social work may advance in the future. However, those involved in drafting and delivering these courses have expressed utter dissatisfaction mainly because these courses are the product of intuitive knowledge; and, thus, lack systematic and empirical curriculum responses to the actual scenarios of disaster contexts explored above. To this, one of the heads of social work at the reputed university noted that,

There has been some emphasis on social work and disaster management in more recent years, especially in the backdrop of Nepal earthquake 2015. However, the curriculum has been designed and taught by someone who is not from social work background. Also, there is a dearth of research in the area of disaster and social work in Nepal. (Name not provided for anonymity, personal communication on 6 January 2023)

Likewise, an educator teaching disaster-related course in one of the reputed private social work colleges said that,

The course on disaster and social work that we offer only provides basic information of disaster. While it may aware social work students about disaster as an important field of social work, it however does not equip them with relevant knowledge and skills which are required in practice settings. (Name not provided for anonymity, personal communication on 17 November 2023)

To this end, while research in other areas of Nepali social work has already begun and emerging piecemeal (see for instance, Yadav, 2019; Ghimire et al., 2024), disaster and social work is yet to be systematically explored. And hence, what is urgently needed is that Nepali social workers timely explore this topic. The first step in this endeavour would be to revisit its disaster-related curriculums; and then, build an effective strategy to advance its disaster-related curriculum, which has been explored in the ensuing section.

Implication and conclusion

After carefully considering the abovementioned contexts and discussions of disasters situations, their governance and social work, Figure 2 proposes a strategic framework on how disaster and social work education can be advanced in the future in Nepal. Worth noting, this framework should be treated as flexible and adaptive rather than being a rigid one. The way Nepali social work education will advance, as well as the needs that will emerge in the future, this framework will have to be adjusted accordingly.

This proposed framework recognises the importance of multi-stakeholders’ inputs in designing and deciding on disaster and social work education in Nepal. As shown in Figure 2, these multi-stakeholders include Nepali social work educators, practitioners, and researchers. Educators’ experiences from the classrooms might help to determine effective pedagogy for disaster and social work curriculum. As mentioned above, despite their designations other than social workers, many social work graduates are affiliated with the government and non-government agencies and contribute to the sector of disaster in Nepal. Involving them in this endeavour is instrumental since they will be informed about requisite knowledge, competencies and skills required of social work graduates if they wish to work at those agencies. And likewise, researchers’ involvement in the process will help to produce evidenced-based curriculums on disaster and social work in Nepal.

This framework also suggests that social workers in Nepali diaspora must be identified; and, their potential inputs should be equally considered in the process. It has been found that currently several Nepali social work graduates work overseas. Their experiences as practitioners, academics and researchers especially in the field of disaster will add value to deliver effective disaster and social work curriculums in Nepal.

Additionally, this framework also seeks to involve academics, researchers, experts and international organisations as friends of Nepali social workers who can potentially enrich Nepali social workers’ efforts to deliver effective disaster and social work education in Nepal. For instance, scholars like Lena Dominelli and Bala Raju Nikku despite not being Nepali social workers have long contributed to the development of Nepali social work. Their works in this area in particular (Nikku, 2015; Dominelli, 2018) might greatly benefit Nepali social workers’ aspiration to systematically advance disaster and social work education in Nepal. Likewise, the International Federation of Social Workers and the International Association of Schools of Social Work have not only been interested in the development of Nepali social work but also they were engaged in responding to Nepal’s 2015 earthquake in one or another way. Considering them as friends of Nepali social workers, and thereafter, constructively involving them might accelerate the overall process of designing and drafting an effective disaster and social work education in Nepal.

Once this occurs; then, the need will be to engage them in an extensive discussion to systematically design disaster and social work curriculum in Nepal. Curriculum thus produced, as discussed above, should respond to disaster events and compliment the disaster governance processes, policies and actors; and, most importantly, address the existing shortcomings within Nepali social work relating to disaster responses. Once all of these have been completed, Nepali universities based on their institutional capacities and available resources for them can offer required, elective or specialised disaster and social work education.

Conflict of interest statement

None declared.

References