Disaster communications with resettled refugees: Six principles of engagement

Abstract

While offering critical protections, refugee resettlement can present a challenge for disaster communications as the people being settled may have limited linguistic competencies of the host language, social capital networks, and awareness of local hazards. Presenting three case studies of resettled refugees living in different geographic locations across New Zealand, we outline six principles of disaster communications to improve engagement with culturally and linguistically diverse groups. Across the three studies, we implemented a research design of working with refugee-background research assistants to conduct interviews and focus groups with 175 people from refugee backgrounds (51 interviews and 21 focus groups) about their perspectives of and potential responses to natural hazards and disaster events. As the three sites are characterised by differential exposure to disaster risk, we discuss the implications for disaster communications and examine how culture, linguistic competencies, gender, age, geography and other social locations have relevance for disaster communication approaches.