He looked around the room, which was filled with an odd mix of academics, practitioners, and policymakers from around the world, and it felt special.
It had been 14 years since John somewhat stumbled into this emerging, yet critical, area of law that seeks to protect people on what might be the worst day of their lives – the day the earthquake hits, the floodwaters rise, and the pandemic sends us into lockdown.
It is an important topic, yet this was one of the first conferences of its kind in the world, certainly the first in the Asia Pacific—a region that faces more disaster risk than anywhere else in the world.
Looking back on his disaster law journey, if you had told John 14 years ago that he would spend his working life studying disaster law, he says he would have laughed. “I’d written one article on it, but somehow it struck a chord.”
And that it took 14 years to host a regional conference?
“That’s the story of the limited resources we face in the academic and humanitarian sectors and the time it takes to build the networks required to link the academic to the practical,” John said.
“But we did it. Key regional decision-makers and experts from across the region all made it to Christchurch, and not only was it a great success, but it also had the feeling of something much bigger. The main question people have asked in the wake of the event is, when is the next one?”
The law – the first victim of a disaster
John’s journey into disaster law began with the Canterbury earthquake sequences of 2010 and 2011. The then public law academic was teaching at the University of Canterbury and, with no prior involvement in the field of disaster law, began to see a lot of legal issues stemming from the disaster that needed commentary.
“At the start, I was caught up in the reality of a disaster. The practicalities of managing two young children in a very difficult environment, but as time went on, I noticed that people outside the region lost interest. As the cameras left, sympathy, patience, and interest from the rest of the country ebbed away, and I realised that disasters are long-term events – not just the emergency response that we see in the media.
“I started reading about other disasters and realised that recovery takes decades (if it happens at all), but everyone focussed on the short term. That led me to question, if the recovery takes so long, why are we using emergency powers – what’s the rush?
“As a result, I wrote an academic article about the fact that administrative law was forgotten about in the disaster. We make lots of decisions in normal times, and we have lots of administrative rules around them. You have to consult, and you have to listen to the other side to make these rules. And then comes the disaster. The rules go into the bin. I wrote that the first victim of the earthquakes was the law.
“And that was it, I felt it was done. I was busy and stressed enough dealing with the reality of living through a disaster. My house was badly damaged, and the university itself was struggling.”
A colleague disagreed, telling him that no one else was looking into legal issues in disasters and to keep going. John thought – fair enough – and kept going. He connected up with fellow travellers around the world – not a lot, but people were there, he says, including the International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent, the technical leaders in this field of law.
John then oversaw one of the first disaster law PhD projects, undertaken by Robert Kipp, which looked at the operation of the Canterbury Earthquake Recovery.
“He found that the core problem was that the centralised system of government in New Zealand meant that the attempts to localise recovery failed. We needed to fix these issues in advance if we wanted to avoid the problems of centrally imposed recovery that plagued Christchurch.”
Over time, a disaster law research group emerged, led by John and another colleague, Toni Collins, who had undertaken a PhD in the field. Slowly, the group took on postgraduate students and undertook various projects in the field, particularly in partnership with QuakeCoRE (the NZ Centre for Earthquake Resilience).
Then, in 2020, another disaster hit—the COVID-19 pandemic. While seemingly different from an earthquake, the legal implications and impacts of the public health emergency were very similar.
“All of a sudden, we were all talking about emergency laws and the powers of lockdowns, and again, the law became the first victim. But I felt the conversation and commentary weren’t there, and what discussion there wasn’t accurate. By now, we knew what we were talking about in this space and decided the time was right to formally launch a group of academics working in the disaster law space.”
The Institute of Law, Emergencies and Disasters (LEAD) was formed in 2020 at the University of Canterbury, bringing together a cluster of legal academics and partners from a number of other disciplines to study the role of law in the management of disasters and look to ways of improving it.
As the only disaster law research centre in the world, LEAD works to bring together lawyers and non-lawyers to advance the legal frameworks around disasters. In doing so, it builds upon the idea that law is not just the written rules that operate in society but includes all the methods that channel how society operates. This approach is particularly suited to disaster studies where the processes are often informal, especially in regions such as the Pacific, where much of the law is customary.
Not stopping there, John was instrumental in establishing another group, the International Disaster, Emergency and Law Network (IDEAL), to bring together academics, practitioners, and students involved with disaster law from across the globe.
Today, just four years on, LEAD is the foremost research group for disaster law in the world and is already involved in several research projects related to legal perspectives of hazards, emergencies, and disasters, and published in a wide variety of national and international publications on the topic of law in emergencies and disasters.
This unique nature of LEAD and IDEAL has led them to act as focal points for disaster lawyers around the world who often sit somewhat isolated in their faculties and departments. John says many legal academics have never considered their work to be disaster-related.
“Legal academics are rewarded for working in the traditional silos of contract and tort, public and private law, without thinking about how the legal system impacts upon wider society. There is hardly an area of law that doesn’t connect with emergencies and disasters, and it is in these situations that you need the law most – it’s easy to make legal systems work when everything is going fine.”
The law is your friend
John’s framing of the law as a friend there to help is a pretty good way of explaining the function of disaster law.
“There is a tendency in the field of DRR for practitioners to see the law as something to be avoided or opposed, but good law is there to help, not hinder. Well-written law helps the decision-maker consider the right things and gives the administrator the power (or duty) to reject inappropriate aid or guide planners to avoid creating hazards, for example. Bad law is the enemy, but good law is your friend.”
Every preparedness, response, or recovery operation is based on a network of laws, policies, and plans that determine who does what, when, and how – ensuring people are assisted. The law needs provisions for the most vulnerable – people with disabilities, for example, need to be considered when decisions are made around preparedness and response.
“It’s all too easy for the decision-maker to think issues are too hard and to ignore the needs of the vulnerable in the name of the emergency. A good legal framework stops that from happening or at least reduces its likelihood. Or we know we need early warning systems, but we can’t rely on these just happening to happen. They must be mandated by law, and the procedures for how they work need to be detailed. Who gives the warning, what evidence should they use, when the warning is given, what powers are there to act on it, and who has them?”
But how is this disaster law ‘friend’ helping us, and what impact has John seen in his time?
“This kind of work has long-term impacts, and the effects are often hard to see in daily life. The legal frameworks sit in the background, guiding decisions and ready for use when the hazard strikes. For me, in the research and advocacy space, the biggest impact has been creating awareness and changing attitudes around the importance of law in reducing disaster risk. And I think we’ve done that over time. Even the conference is a testament to this
“The greatest impact is seen on the ground, not in the university; how do these laws help people and communities? Do they help protect or prepare them for disaster? Do they help them during the emergency and in the long-term recovery? There is no doubt that when this is done right, disaster law does these things, but it’s a slow process from a pretty low base.”
A good example of this, John says, was seen around the ability of Pacific Island States to manage the isolation that emerged during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“This was a real challenge for these states as commercial operators stopped flying due to the lack of passenger traffic (particularly tourists). The result was a humanitarian pathway which arranged for flights bringing essential supplies and fast-tracked the paperwork required to achieve this. This was done on the back of existing disaster cooperation mechanisms across the Pacific but was still somewhat of a last-minute process. Next time, one hopes that the legal frameworks to achieve this will already be in place, and this is currently a focus for discussion in the Pacific Islands Forum.”
A moment for disaster law
While the conference was a bit of a moment for Professor John Hopkins, disaster law is having quite a moment this year, too.
2024 marks the 20th anniversary of disaster law’s establishment as a priority area within the IFRC and the establishment of its disaster law programme. The organisation had seen time and time again that legal gaps and barriers were delaying international disaster response, so it embarked on research in the field, eventually leading to the IDRL guidelines of 2007.
Discussions are also currently underway regarding developing a global treaty – the first of its kind – to help save lives and keep communities safe by strengthening the management of disasters and disaster risk. A working group will meet at the United Nations General Assembly later this year to discuss the prospect of a treaty.
Disaster law is on the agenda at this year’s Asia Pacific Ministerial Conference for Disaster Risk Reduction, one of the most significant meetings for the disaster sector.
Closer to home, John says he is participating in Aotearoa New Zealand’s national earthquake simulation exercise (Rū Whenua)—the first time disaster law has been included in such an event.
“This might not seem like a big deal, but it is. This is the first time we have been included, and it is a crucial opportunity to test the use of existing laws, policies, and plans. A lot is going on, but there is still so much more to be done.”
Despite significant improvements in recent decades, many countries still need to strengthen their laws, policies, and procedures to effectively manage the risks and impacts of disasters and emergencies.
Professor Hopkins says that the biggest factor in the growth of disaster law isn’t a good one.
“Every day, the impacts of climate change come closer and are felt harder, and the frequency and intensity of disasters are increasing. The need for strong and relevant disaster laws to help keep people safe and save lives is greater than ever. Now is the time to do this work. It’s urgent.”