ABSTRACT
This chapter begins by discussing the nature of the activities called “framing” and “defining” and troubling commonsense assumptions about how and why people develop typologies. With these cautions in mind, we describe in detail one particular framing of disaster risk known as the “progression of vulnerability” or “pressure and release” (PAR) framework. This framework works as a vehicle for encouraging questions about root causes, intermediate processes, and unsafe conditions. We proceed to review the many applications of PAR that have been carried out since its original publication in 1994. In addition, nine other ways of framing disaster risk are presented, including those built around the concepts of “the space of vulnerability”, “capacity and vulnerability”, and “forensic analysis”.
