Disaster and society: The 1985 Mexican earthquakes

exploitations, but a broader view would point out that the practices are part of the only possible responses ordinary people have in the face of societal developments beyond their control. (Morren 1983: 285, 288) ).

Natural disasters result for the dominant paradigm from "extremes" in geophysical processes, and human actions facing them are primarily explained by the nature of such processes. Literature and recommendations deal mainly with geophysical monitoring, forecasting or direct engineering or land-use planning. No one could deny the importance of social or economic factors, but "it is nature which decides where and what social conditions or responses will become significant." The geography of hazards is therefore treated as synonymous with the mapping and the study of the spatial distribution and frequencies of extreme natural events. Adjustments to hazard are a matter of experts, planning and government measures backed up by science. Ordinary human activity "can do little except make the problem worse by default." (Hewitt 1983b: 5ff).

The dominant view implies a convergence in opinions or approaches, dominating in the allocation of research resources, the number of personnel involved and the volume of their publications, and further the acceptance of their views by the institutions of rich, industrialized countries. This body of ideas has changed over time, but is coherent enough to constitute a paradigm or a consensus. Its strength is to be a "construct, reflecting the shaping hand of contemporary social order." (Hewitt 1983b: 4). Agencies of national governments and international organizations adopted the same concern and supporting ideas. Under the 80's, some alternative ideas were partially accepted, as shown in latter documents from UNDRO, UNO, or large NGOs as the Swedish Red Cross (UNDRO-IDNDR, United Nations 1988, Hagman 1985, Wijkman 1985) Disasters challenge the normal order and power structures, so they are interpreted as something strange, outside these structures, and dangerous to them. This fact and the placement of the problem in narrowing fields of research and specialization, created a sense of discontinuity and otherness between disaster and normality. Disaster, like other social disturbances, was isolated.

Disaster in the 20th-century international system involves comparable pressures upon dominant institutions and knowledge as did the 'crazed poor' in the social and economic crises that formed the underbelly of the Enlightenment. Madness and calamity are very disturbing (Hewitt 1983b: