Migrant Urban Settlements and Disaster Management

Abstract

Urban cities which look smart with towering structures, massive infrastructure, have their backbone in the migrant labor, but they are also the ones which are most vulnerable to the plight of disasters. Migrant labor move to cities for better livelihood and income opportunities, but the city’s landscape with its high rental rates, unplanned growth, does not accommodate the needs of the migrant population thus pushing them to periphery. Migrant communities usually occupy spaces that are hazard-prone areas and are vulnerable to disaster risk. These spaces come up as squatters, slums, and jhuggis that lack formal recognition of ownership rights with dwindled space, lack of basic infrastructure, and have higher population density that adds to the vulnerability of migrant communities. This affects the coping capacity of the migrant communities in the aftermath of a disaster, and it also poses a greater risk to these vulnerable communities in disaster response and recovery. This chapter argues that the migrant communities occupying spaces in hazard-prone areas differ in their context and vulnerability; therefore, there is no one-size-fits-all approach in disaster risk management. It therefore needs a bottom-up community-based participatory approach that integrates the efforts of communities in disaster preparedness, risk, and resilience.