Factors influencing acceptance or rejection regarding being the host community for post-disaster resettlements in developing countries

Hemba Geekiyanage, MD; Keraminiyage, KP; Fernando, TP; Jayawickrama, T

Abstract

Post-disaster relocations have both positive and negative impacts on host communities. Receiving the
host community’s willingness to host the new community is essential to ensure integration and the
sustainability of the new resettlement. This “willingness” is influenced by a variety of factors which
have not been adequately studied by researchers and policymakers. This study, therefore, investigates
the latent variables influencing a host community's decision to accept or reject disaster-induced
resettlements. The study employed a survey approach utilising a questionnaire that contained 70 factors
influencing host communities' perspectives on resettlements. A randomly selected 250 respondents
from host communities were asked to indicate the factors that influence their level of agreement to be
the host for displaced parties based on a 1-5 Likert-scale. The responses were analysed using the factor
analysis: principal component analysis (PCA) and exploratory factor analysis (EFA) respectively. The
PCA extracted 16 components which influence a host community’s decision to accept/reject displaced
communities (which account for nearly 70% of the total variance). The three most significant
components were the impact on livelihoods and access to resources (total variance of 13%), political
power and human wellbeing (9%), access to public services and social security (7%). The EFA revealed
58 sub-latent variables consisting of a majority of rejection factors (90%) with very few influences to
accept displaced communities. The study’s findings can be used by authorities and policymakers who
design and implement post-disaster relocation programmes in understanding a host community’s
viewpoints and their involvement in making the resettlements successful and sustainable.

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Nov 17, 2020
• Online Publication Date: Nov 26, 2020
• Publication Date: Feb 1, 2021
• Deposit Date: Nov 19, 2020
• Publicly Available Date: Nov 30, 2020
• Journal: International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction
• Print ISSN: 2212-4209
• Publisher: Elsevier
• Volume: 53
• Pages: 101973
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijdrr.2020.101973
• Publisher URL: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijdrr.2020.101973
• Related Public URLs: http://www.journals.elsevier.com/international-journal-of-disaster-risk-reduction/
• Additional Information: Funders : Global Challenges Research Fund (GCRF);Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC);Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC); Grant Number: ES/T003219/1; Grant Number: EP/PO28543/1