Disaster as Opportunity? Building Back Better in Aceh, Myanmar and Haiti

The Indian Ocean tsunami of 2004 was a disaster of unparalleled proportions, devastating the lives and livelihoods of millions of people across 14 countries.
It also prompted an international response that was unprecedented in its scale. Billions of dollars were raised for relief and reconstruction, and thousands of people and hundreds of aid agencies from around the world were directly involved in recovery efforts. The response sought not just to reinstate what the tsunami had destroyed, but to leave the communities it had affected better, fairer, stronger and more peaceful than they had been before the disaster struck. As former US President Bill Clinton put it in his capacity as UN Special Envoy for Tsunami Recovery: ‘We need to make sure that this recovery process accomplishes more than just restoring what was there before’. This aspiration – encapsulated in the phrase ‘build back better’ – quickly became
the recovery effort’s mantra, guiding principle and enduring promise. Within months, the recovery came to be regarded as a means not only to rebuild assets indand capacities directly affected by the disaster, but also to bring to an end long-running civil conflicts in Aceh and Sri Lanka; build the capacity of institutions; expand access to services such as health and education; reduce poverty and strengthen livelihood security; advance gender equality; and empower and open up spaces for civil society.