ABSTRACT
This chapter analyzes the Beirut explosion and the mismanagement of the crisis through the lens of disaster management and corruption in light of the presence of a strong civil society. It argues that four different factors affect the response of the state: failure of the bureaucracy, lack of a presence of clear disaster management strategy at the national level, an economic crisis that led to increasing poverty rates, and the lack of cooperation from civil society. This chapter demonstrates how the Beirut explosion highlighted the failure of the Lebanese government in its disaster management and mainly mitigation and response phases, and how local NGOs and initiatives faced several challenges that affected their performance during the response to the Beirut Port explosion. Moreover, it illustrated how the lack of coordination and cooperation on the part of the different players on the ground, coupled with competition over the international fund, negatively affected the response rate. Although organizations tried to bypass the role of the state and directly intervene on the ground, this proved to be a wrong strategy. To be able to have a clear mitigation strategy, a holistic and participatory approach should be adopted: levels of corruption should be reduced, an economic strategy should be adopted, and civil society should be included in the national disaster strategy. Only then would the Lebanese state be able to have a holistic approach to disaster management and response.
