Social vulnerability helps to explain why communities experience the consequences of an extreme event, such as an earthquake, differently, even when they are subjected to similar levels of intensity (ground shaking). The differential impacts of an earthquake can indeed be a consequence of social vulnerability, hence, it is a critical element for fostering mitigation plans and developing policies to reduce seismic risk. This study addresses the assessment of the social vulnerability and resilience level of the city of Nablus, Palestine, a region affected by seismic events and political conflicts. The method employed is the Scorecard Approach, a self-assessment and participatory tool that measures resilience with qualitatively derived information at two different urban levels: population and local administration. The results enable the resilience assessment of different districts of Nablus concerning several themes relevant to disaster risk reduction. The latter facilitate the better understanding of how different variablessuch as gender, age, educational level, monthly income and membership neighbourhoodinfluence the social vulnerability level. Furthermore, by applying a spatial analysis method to the case study region, it is observed that resilient indicators are not spatially random, but rather geographically correlated.
Using large-scale seismic risk assessment studies for reduction of potential losses is becoming an evermore popular trend around the globe. Accordingly, a number of different models and techniques for the characterization of the different risk variables have proliferated in the recent years. Furthermore, the quality, or accuracy, of risk estimates will be certainly higher when a truly integrative model is employed, characterizing hazard, (physical and social) vulnerability and exposure in the most complete as possible manner. Regions with a large percentage of non-seismically designed buildings are particularly vulnerable to seismic events and are those that can benefit the most from risk assessment studies for decision making. As such, the main purpose of this study is to propose a framework for integrated seismic risk assessment in Palestine, where earthquake induced risk awareness is still at an early stage. A methodology to combine an existing state-of-the-art hazard model with new vulnerability and exposure models, specifically built upon local field surveys and national data collection, is proposed. The outcome of the study will enable the identification of the regions that are more vulnerable to earthquakes and future rapid loss assessment at regional scale.
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