“Filling the void”: the diversified grassroots disaster narratives of the 2023 riverine flood in Z City, China
Abstract
Purpose
Disaster narratives constitute a crucial and unique element in disaster understanding, recovery and communication. Along with facing various severe disasters, China’s dominant official disaster narratives have played an indispensable role in promoting post-disaster social solidarity. However, the consequences of “weak” official disaster narratives remain unknown.
Design/methodology/approach
In 2023, during a riverine flood in northern China’s Z City, diversified grassroots disaster narratives emerged, “filling the void” when the official narratives were comparatively “weak”. This paper uses this riverine flood in Z City as an uncommon case to analyze the official-grassroots disaster narrative interaction. During fieldwork, first-hand and second-hand data from in-depth interviews, on-site visits and public information were collected.
Findings
Based on fieldwork, this paper first introduced the “weak” official disaster narratives in Z City. Second, this paper organized and classified these grassroots disaster narratives into three interconnected stages: the flood’s causes, government and social responses, and recovery. In “filling the void,” “sacrifice” and “betrayed” sensemaking are detected and functions of these diversified grassroots disaster narratives become clear.
Originality/value
Official and grassroots disaster narratives are not simply competing, but complementary. As a unique soft lens to interpret disasters, this paper further discussed grassroots disaster narratives’ underlying connotations and potential impacts on social resilience building. Also, this paper provides insights into the disaster narrative dynamics, especially in China’s political and cultural context.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to acknowledge the following funding source in undertaking this research: National Philosophy and Social Sciences Foundation of China (Grant/Award Number: 22ZDA119), and the authors would like to thank all the participants during the field work and all the help from the reviewers and editors.
Citation
Xu, P., Zhan, C. and Xu, M. (2024), "“Filling the void”: the diversified grassroots disaster narratives of the 2023 riverine flood in Z City, China", Disaster Prevention and Management, Vol. ahead-of-print No. ahead-of-print. https://doi.org/10.1108/DPM-04-2024-0098
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2024, Emerald Publishing Limited