ABSTRACT
An overarching goal of the International Decade for Natural Disaster Reduction (IDNDR) is that by the end of the 1990s all countries should have comprehensive plans and activities dedicated to disaster reduction. These plans and activities are to form part of the individual country’s strategy for sustainable development – thus setting out the formal link between hazards and sustainability. More concretely, the recently completed Second Assessment of United States hazards research has taken as its overarching theme the integration of hazards and sustainability (Mileti, 1999). Exactly what constitutes sustainable development is a matter of much argument. Nevertheless, it does not mean the elimination of flooding or necessarily even of flood disasters – whatever they may be (Quarantelli, 1998; and see Myers and Passerini, Chapter 14).
