Ricerc@Sapienza

This chapter is designed to fill this gap through a preliminary empirical analysis of a case study, which represents a best practice in cross-sector partnerships in humanitarian logistics, and aims to investigate the following research questions:
RQ1: Can companies concretely learn agility from the humanitarian sector in emergency relief operations?
RQ2: What do they concretely learn in terms of agility?

In this paper we examine the use of Twitter and Facebook in two dramatic earthquakes that hit Italy: L’Aquila (in 2009) and Emilia (in 2012). Indeed, disasters disrupt everyday life and engage people in meaning-making processes aimed at recovering meaning and control of their world. In these cases, we argue that the use of social media may contribute to social representa- tions processes and functions: cognitive coping, social sharing of emotions, preserving self-efficacy, boosting identity, and community empowerment.

According to the Census Report, 2009, the landscape is the only root of national identity in Italy. The unity of this country, which is weak in terms of the values shared by Italians, finds a true source of integration in the affection of the citizens for the natural and architectural environments. One of the few reasons why Italians feel that Italy is a unified nation is that they greatly admire their territory.

Recent events have shown how the Built Environment (BE), defined as a network of buildings, infrastructures and open spaces, and its users are more and more prone to disasters, showing very poor resilience. The paper focuses on the state of the art concerning the relation between BE and Sudden-onset disasters (SUOD) considering the risks and human behavior.

L’impatto dei disastri naturali o tecnologici, risulta potenzialmente maggiore sulle aree urbane, dove la densità abitativa incrementa la gravità dei danni e delle ripercussioni socio-economiche dovute all’interruzione dei servizi essenziali. L’ambiente costruito è contraddistinto da caratteristiche protettive, che possono rappresentare un elemento importante per ridurre il rischio di catastrofe ed incrementare la resilienza degli insediamenti umani.