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Why ‘small is beautiful’ in municipal disaster

risk reduction: Evidence from the Yucatán
peninsula, Mexico
a b
Emily Wilkinson
a
Department of Geography , University College London , Pearson Building,
Gower Street, London , WC1E 6BT , UK
b
Now at: Overseas Development Institute, 111 Westminster Bridge Road,
London , SE1 7JD , UK
Published online: 01 Feb 2012.

To cite this article: Emily Wilkinson (2012) Why ‘small is beautiful’ in municipal disaster risk
reduction: Evidence from the Yucatán peninsula, Mexico, Environmental Hazards, 11:2, 155-171, DOI:
10.1080/17477891.2011.609878

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 research paper

Why `small is beautiful' in municipal disaster risk reduction:

Evidence from the Yucatán peninsula, Mexico
EMILY WILKINSON1,2,*

1
Department of Geography, University College London, Pearson Building, Gower Street, London WC1E 6BT, UK
2
Now at: Overseas Development Institute, 111 Westminster Bridge Road, London SE1 7JD, UK
Downloaded by [Tata Institute of Social Sciences] at 03:29 13 December 2013

A decentralized, partnership approach to dealing with environmental hazards is advocated in international policy documents, but
the capacity of local governments to formulate and implement disaster risk reduction (DRR) strategies is uneven and not well
understood. Small municipalities are often believed to lack the necessary financial, human and administrative resources to carry
out measures to reduce disaster risk. This paper examines DRR practices in five municipalities exposed to hurricanes in the
Yucatán peninsula, Mexico. Using a comparative case study method, performance is measured with respect to five indicators of
DRR that were identified by stakeholders as being ‘municipal government responsibilities’: effective use of risk maps; publication
and enforcement of by-laws and regulations; design and application of risk communication systems; coordination of prepa-
redness measures and evacuations; and shelter management. The two smaller municipalities with few financial resources are
found to have undergone substantial improvements in most aspects of DRR, outperforming larger municipalities facing similar
risks. This suggests that factors beyond the level of funding determine the effectiveness of official DRR measures. In Mexico,
decentralization and local governance reform have proved to be critical, creating opportunities for more inclusive, effective
approaches to reducing the risks associated with hurricanes.
Keywords: disaster risk reduction; hurricanes; Mexico; preparedness

1. Support for local-level disaster risk reduction
Substantial progress has been made towards devel-
oping appropriate national policies for disaster risk
reduction (DRR), guided by the Hyogo Framework
for Action 2005–2015 (HFA) (UN/ISDR, 2011).
A key feature of the HFA is the emphasis it places
on decentralization of responsibilities and
resources for DRR. National governments are
urged to ‘recognise the importance and specificity
of local risk patterns and trends, [and] decentralize
responsibilities and resources for disaster risk
reduction to relevant sub-national or local auth-
orities, as appropriate’ (UN/ISDR, 2005, p. 6).
However, the extent to which DRR has actually
been decentralized, and the effectiveness of local
policies produced as a result, is unclear.
Decentralization processes have been under-
taken all over the developing world, supported
by the World Bank, as a panacea for many
problems in developing countries, including
overloaded public sectors, macroeconomic
instability and corruption (World Bank, 2001,
2004). Advocates of local-level DRR draw on
many of the assumptions used in support of
decentralization: chiefly, that it generates
greater efficiency in public services delivery and
deepens democracy. Decentralization is believed
to increase efficiency because local governments
are more aware of the service needs of local resi-
dents, so decision making can be more responsive
to the people for whom the services are intended
(Tiebout, 1956; Oates, 1972, 1977; Shah, 1994,
1998; Finot, 2005). Access to public services is

B *Email: e.wilkinson@odi.org.uk
ENVIRONMENTAL HAZARDS 11 (2012) 155–171
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/17477891.2011.609878 # 2012 Taylor & Francis ISSN: 1747-7891 (print), 1878-0059 (online) www.tandfonline.com/tenh
 156 Wilkinson
also expected to be more equitable under
decentralization (UNDP, 2002). In addition,
decentralization is believed to increase political
participation and accountability (Turner and
Hulme, 1997; Grindle, 2007; USAID, 2009). In a
decentralized system of government, citizens
can expect greater opportunities to demand
public attention to their needs, monitor how
government responds to their demands and
hold public officials accountable for the perform-
ance of public services. Decentralization also
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makes it easier for citizens to organize around
common concerns because at municipal level,
common objectives are easier to identify and
issues of collective action are less complex than
at higher levels of government (Grindle, 2007,
p. 124).
Local governments everywhere are likely to
play a more prominent role in DRR because of
decentralization (Twigg, 2004, pp. 67 – 69; UN/
ISDR, 2004, p. 81), and this will open up opportu-
nities for greater community participation (UN/
ISDR, 2005; DFID, 2006). Community partici-
pation is supported by the HFA and other inter-
national policy documents, and NGOs with DRR
projects commonly adopt the ‘participation’
label, if not the substance (Twigg et al., 2001,
p. 11). Advocates of participatory approaches to
risk reduction anticipate benefits in terms of
greater effectiveness, appropriateness, efficiency
and sustainability of interventions, and argue
that participation may even produce more equi-
table outcomes (for a more in-depth analysis, see
Maskrey, 1989, 1994; Lavell, 1994; Lavell et al.,
2003; Heijmans, 2004; Twigg, 2004; Wisner
et al., 2004; DFID, 2006). They also believe that
communities must put pressure on government
to develop more proactive policies to deal with
disaster (Delica-Willison and Willison, 2004;
Heijmans, 2004; Tearfund, 2007). However,
active, broad-based, public interest groups
pressing for government action to reduce disaster
risk are a rarity and community-based organiz-
ations, particularly in resource-poor municipali-
ties, generally respond to more pressing
day-to-day concerns, such as the provision of
basic services (access to drinking water, healthcare
ENVIRONMENTAL HAZARDS
and education), employment and crime (May,
1991; Birkland, 1996; Tearfund, 2007).
2. Municipal capacity
For DRR to be effective, local governments need
to be able to analyse the level of risk and under-
stand how to reduce it and have the human
and financial capacity to implement suitable pol-
icies (Henstra, 2006). This would suggest that
small municipal governments with few resources
are less effective in reducing risk. According to
John Handmer (1996), municipal population
size is a plausible proxy for DRR capacity, as gov-
ernments in larger municipalities are likely to
have more expertise, authority and availability
of money, and therefore greater capacity. A
Council of Europe (1995) document reinforces
this idea, suggesting that local governments
with fewer than 5,000 people lack the capacity
to undertake many public service delivery tasks
effectively. The evidence base is not very strong,
but the results of two studies support this view:
i) An Inter-American Development Bank
report on local-level DRR found that small muni-
cipalities in Colombia suffer from low levels of
capacity to analyse risk and limited resources,
both financial and technical, to manage it
(Bollin et al., 2003). In 2000, 60 per cent of muni-
cipalities in the country had adopted the concept
of prevention in their spatial planning, but
deficiencies were observed in the application of
these plans, above all in small municipalities
and rural areas.
ii) An International Strategy for Disaster
Reduction (ISDR) assessment of progress on
implementing the HFA found that local govern-
ments in developing countries, particularly in
rural and isolated areas, lacked the human, tech-
nical, financial and institutional capacities
needed to address disaster risk (UN/ISDR, 2009).
Other studies, however, suggest that municipal
size and policy effectiveness may not be directly
correlated. Although very small municipalities
face severe resource constraints, and this is
 Why ‘small is beautiful’ in municipal disaster risk reduction 157
likely to limit their capacity to reduce disaster
risk, the opposite is not necessarily true for large
municipalities. Studies of other public services
show that large city bureaucracies are insensitive
and unresponsive to the needs of local residents
and therefore less efficient and effective in deli-
vering local services (Ostrom and Whitaker,
1973; Ostrom, 1976; Percy, 2003). One study of
policing in urban areas, for example, found that
larger departments do not provide higher levels
of services, as measured by citizen experiences
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and evaluations (Ostrom, 1976).
Small is beautiful has become a popular catch-
phrase thanks to arguments for small-scale organ-
ization of public and private activities put
forward by Fritz Schumacher (1973) in his
seminal work with that title. Schumacher chal-
lenges doctrines of specialization and large-scale
production and organization and proposes
small-scale, collective solutions to development
and environmental problems. With regard to
political and social affairs, he argues that while
it is impossible to calculate the appropriate scale
of a city, it is clear that there is an upper limit of
what is desirable – something in the order of
half a million inhabitants. Cities gain nothing
by being any larger, although it is much harder
to judge what the lower limit should be.
The institutional environment and, in particu-
lar, interactions between different levels of
governance are also expected to influence local
DRR capacity, although only limited research
has been done on this issue. One example is the
Philippines, where national legislative and
organizational arrangements have received
some attention because of the emphasis placed
on strengthening local-level DRR. Overall, the
Philippines is believed to have developed enabling
institutional arrangements for local-level DRR:
national legislation endows local government
with the power and resources to deliver basic
services, including ‘much needed support
structures to sustain community-based disaster
risk management (CBDRM) initiatives’ (ADPC,
2008, p. 18). Nevertheless, in one study, local
governments were found to lack adequate
organizational structures and financial capacity
to carry out functions such as DRR training and
planning meetings (UNDP, 2006; Benson, 2009).
3. DRR in Mexico
Mexico is a good location to study local-level DRR
and the institutional environment because muni-
cipalities in Mexico are autonomous units of gov-
ernment, responsible for providing a range of
public services, although federal and state gov-
ernments did not respect this autonomy until
recently. From the late 1920s until the 1980s,
Mexico was ruled at federal, state and municipal
levels by a single political party, the Institutional
Revolutionary Party (PRI). The concentration of
government power in the presidency ensured a
centralist, autocratic political culture and this
determined intergovernmental relationships:
state governors owed their position to the presi-
dent; municipal presidents owed theirs to the
state governor; and all were expected to support
presidential policy initiatives. A 25-year process
of decentralization and democratic transition
has given Mexico’s municipalities greater finan-
cial and political autonomy, although a series of
constraints to this autonomy still exist, limiting
municipal government capacity to implement
DRR measures that respond to local needs.
The National Civil Protection System (SINA-
PROC) is based on the principle of subsidiarity,
so the lowest level of government, the municipal-
ity, is primarily responsible for DRR: only if the
capacity of the municipality is surpassed, the
state government intervenes; and if the capacity
of the state is surpassed, the federal government
intervenes. In principle then, higher levels of gov-
ernment will not intervene unless a disaster is
declared and the municipal government asks for
support. In non-emergency situations, municipal
governments are responsible for identifying risks,
producing and updating a risk map and a Civil
Protection programme, carrying out capacity-
building exercises to improve emergency
response and promoting ‘a culture of civil protec-
tion and prevention’ (SEGOB, 2006, p. 47). The
federal government provides indirect support to
ENVIRONMENTAL HAZARDS
 158 Wilkinson
municipalities through regular workshops on
organizational aspects of SINAPROC and techni-
cal aspects of monitoring hazards and communi-
cating risk to the public.
Despite this broadly enabling normative fra-
mework, however, municipalities face a number
of constraints. One of the main criticisms of
SINAPROC relates to the reactionary nature of
Civil Protection legislation. According to the
National Civil Protection Law (2000, art. 3), a dis-
aster is an event in which a population suffers
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damage or loss to its members, infrastructure or
environment due to the impact of a (natural or
anthropogenic) hazard. ‘Prevention’ refers to
the preparedness functions to be carried out
before a disaster to reduce its impact on the
exposed population. The law therefore pays
little attention to the underlying social factors
that contribute to disaster (Mansilla, 1996,
p. 236). According to a World Bank report, the
focus of Civil Protection programmes is on devel-
oping effective monitoring, preparedness and
response strategies, all of which help reduce the
impact of natural hazards, but do not address
the human activities that create disaster.
Authors argue that ‘the core of a mitigation pro-
gramme should be more “upstream measures”
such as the safe location, design and construction
of structures, infrastructure and settlements’
(Kreimer et al., 1999, p. 17).
The extent to which municipalities are willing
and able to implement national DRR mandates
is also constrained by financial arrangements.
Municipal governments are assigned primary
responsibility for DRR, but have few resources
to carry out the range of activities required to
reduce risk. They do not receive any earmarked
funds for Civil Protection and most are unable
to raise more than 5 per cent of revenues
locally, so funds have to be allocated to Civil Pro-
tection from unconditional transfers. In 2007,
these transfers came to 70,692 million pesos
(US$7,069 million), representing 36 per cent of
total municipal income. Civil Protection’s share
of this pie tends to be less than 1 per cent and
funds are used up in operating costs such as elec-
tricity, salaries and maintenance of equipment
ENVIRONMENTAL HAZARDS
(interview, state government official, Mérida, 20
June 2008).
Additional funding for municipal DRR pro-
jects is available through the Disaster Prevention
Fund (FOPREDEN), but proposals must be sub-
mitted by the state government or a federal gov-
ernment agency and are considered for financing
on a case-by-case basis. The review process takes
a year (so projects cannot be of an urgent
nature), and few proposals meet the require-
ments and receive funding. In 2005, only 25
per cent of the budget was actually used
(Puente, 2005). Agencies and governments
applying to FOPREDEN find it bureaucratic and
frustrating (interview, state government official,
Chetumal, 15 May 2008). Overall, funding for
post-disaster reconstruction remains much
higher than financing of pre-emptive DRR pro-
jects (World Bank, 2010). Without any
additional funding, it is unlikely that municipa-
lities will be able or willing to implement the
‘upstream’ measures identified by the World
Bank as being so important for DRR, such as
land-use planning (Kreimer et al., 1999).
Some operational aspects of SINAPROC also
restrict municipal autonomy and capacity to
reduce risk. Decision-making processes for
issuing early warnings and emergency declara-
tions are good examples of this. The federal gov-
ernment designed the early warning system
without consulting lower levels of government,
and federal and state authorities usually decide
which level of alert should be issued and where
and when an emergency should be declared and
residents evacuated (Macı́as, 2005). Municipal
governments have very little say in these critical
decisions, despite their intimate knowledge of
local conditions.
Municipal autonomy is also constrained by the
considerable financial and political influence that
state governments exert over municipal affairs
(Cabrero Mendoza and Carrera Hernández,
2004; Edmonds-Poli, 2006; Grindle, 2007). For
example, by-laws and local development plans
have to be approved, and municipal budgets
reviewed, by state legislatures, and states have
the power to dismiss municipal government
 Why ‘small is beautiful’ in municipal disaster risk reduction 159

officials if they are found to be in dereliction of

their duty (Grindle, 2007). Conflicts over allo-
cation of financial resources are particularly
common and often occur when state and munici-
pal governments are governed by different politi-
cal parties (Rodrı́guez, 1995).
In summary then, despite having a formally
decentralized structure, Mexico’s Civil Protection
system is highly centralized in practice, with
federal government controlling most of the
resources available for DRR and taking important
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decisions about disaster preparedness and

response, and state governments often interven-
ing directly in municipal affairs. These inter-
governmental relationships are likely to influ-
ence municipal capacity to implement effective
DRR measures.

FIGURE 1 The Yucatán peninsula

4. Case study municipalities

Mexico lies within the North Atlantic and
Eastern Pacific tropical cyclone belts and is
affected by hurricanes between June and Novem-
ber, although hurricanes on the east coast tend to
be more frequent and violent (Few and Osbahr,
2006). The Yucatán peninsula, in south-eastern
Mexico, separates the Caribbean Sea from the
Gulf of Mexico (Figure 1) and is regularly affected
by hurricanes. Populations inhabiting the penin-
sula, past and present, are considered to have a
popular culture of hurricanes, deeply embedded
in the local historical and geographical context,
which helps them to cope with environmental
extremes (Konrad, 1985, 2003; Duarte, 2002;
Garcı́a, 2002). Subsistence farming practices, for
example, include emphasis on root crops, terra-
cing and ridged fields, and houses are more resist-
ant, built with round walls and roofs (Konrad,
1985, 2003). A deeper examination of this hurri-
cane culture and how it has been altered by urban-
ization in recent years is beyond the scope of this
paper, however, it is important to bear in mind
this contextual factor, as it helps account for
general improvements in official DRR activities
observed across the Yucatán peninsula. In other
parts of Mexico, DRR is less of a priority: most
municipalities have Civil Protection depart-
ments, but the quality of these varies and ‘in
some cases the department could be just a
telephone number with anyone answering it’
(interview, federal government official, Mexico
City, 11 August 2008).
To explore differences between municipal DRR
practices, five municipalities in the Yucatán
peninsula were selected for comparison: three in
the State of Yucatán and two in the State of Quin-
tana Roo (Figure 2). These municipalities share
a number of biophysical and socioeconomic
characteristics: all are on the coast and have
high levels of exposure to hurricanes and similar
levels of socioeconomic marginalization, as deter-
mined by the National Population Council’s mar-
ginalization index, a multidimensional measure
of deficiencies in education, housing, income
and access to basic utilities (CONAPO, 2006).
The selected municipalities also represent a mix
of demographic characteristics relevant to this
study: Rı́o Lagartos and San Felipe in the State of
Yucatán are small municipalities (less than
25,000 inhabitants), while Felipe Carrillo Puerto
and Lázaro Cárdenas in Quintana Roo and
Tizimı́n in Yucatán are medium-sized municipali-
ties (25,000–100,000 inhabitants) (Table 1).

ENVIRONMENTAL HAZARDS
 160 Wilkinson

(1998 –2008), during which time four hurricanes

passed directly over the Yucatán peninsula: Hurri-
canes Isidore (2002), Emily (2005), Wilma (2005)
and Dean (2005). All five municipalities were hit
directly by at least one hurricane and indirectly
by others. There are no official evaluations of
municipal programmes in Mexico and so data
were drawn from semi-structured interviews,
conducted with four types of respondents: govern-
ment officials, NGO representatives, local commu-
nity leaders and residents of communities most
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affected by recent hurricanes. To improve reliability,

FIGURE 2 Location of the five case study municipalities
Source: Compiled by author, based on information from
INEGI.
There are no large coastal municipalities in Quin-
tana Roo or Yucatán with similar levels of margin-
alization, so none are included in this study.
5. Qualitative data analysis
Progress on developing and implementing DRR
measures was assessed over a 10-year period
source and method triangulation techniques were
used to compare information from different
respondent groups against that found in Civil Pro-
tection plans, financial reports and participant
observation in Civil Protection meetings. The
results presented in section 6 are based on this
analysis.
Five indicators are used to measure progress on
municipal DRR, identified through qualitative
analysis of interview transcripts and other docu-
ments using Atlas-ti software. These five indi-
cators represent key pre-disaster activities that
interviewees felt were municipal government
responsibilities, carried out with the intention
of reducing the risks associated with hurricanes:
1. Risk maps: Design, updating and effective use
of risk maps to identify vulnerable groups
and high-risk locations.
2. By-laws and regulations: Publication and enfor-
cement of a Civil Protection by-law and
land-use regulations to limit construction in
high-risk areas.

TABLE 1 Demographic characteristics of case study municipalities

Name of municipality Area Total Population Percentage of population Level of

(km2) population in main town in main town (%) marginalization

Felipe Carrillo Puerto 13,806 75,026 25,744 34.3 High

Lázaro Cárdenas 3,881 25,333 7,150 28.2 High
Rı́o Lagartos 249 3,438 2,218 64.5 Medium
San Felipe 681 1,839 1,789 97.3 Medium
Tizimı́n 4,772 73,138 46,971 64.2 High

Source: INEGI (2010) and CONAPO (2006).

ENVIRONMENTAL HAZARDS
 Why ‘small is beautiful’ in municipal disaster risk reduction 161

3. Risk communication system: Design and appli-
cation of a public communication system to
provide advice to citizens on how to prepare
for a hurricane and timely warnings for
approaching hurricanes.
4. Preparedness and evacuations: Coordination of
preparedness activities and evacuations from
high-risk areas in advance of a hurricane to
protect lives and assets.
5. Shelter management: Preparation and stocking
of temporary shelters in the main town and
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municipalities financial resources are consider-
ably greater. Civil Protection departments in
Felipe Carrillo Puerto, Lázaro Cárdenas and
Tizimı́n have annual budgets of 862,000 pesos
(US$86,200), 447,000 pesos (US$44,700) and
209,000 pesos (US$20,900), respectively (Con-
gress of the State of Yucatan, 2008; Government
of Felipe Carrillo Puerto, 2008; Government of
Lázaro Cárdenas, 2008). Directors in Lázaro Cár-
denas and Tizimı́n have tertiary education
levels, and all have been provided with a compu-

their management during an emergency.
6. Results of a comparative study
Analysis of progress on DRR produced some unex-
pected findings. In 1998, none of the case study
municipalities had Civil Protection departments,
so all five DRR activities were neglected. Within
2 or 3 years, however, in response to legislation
and pressure from federal and state governments,
all five had set up Civil Protection departments,
responsible for coordinating DRR activities.
However, the financial, human and administra-
tive capacities of these departments vary widely,
and in the two small municipalities (Rı́o Lagartos
and San Felipe), Civil Protection has very few
resources: annual budgets are approximately
67,000 pesos (US$6,700) and 37,000 pesos
(US$3,700) and Civil Protection directors have
only secondary and primary levels of education,
respectively. In neither municipality does the
director have his own office, vehicle, computer
or any support staff. In the three medium-sized
ter, a radio, an office and at least two additional
staff to support administrative and operational
activities (telephone interviews, municipal gov-
ernment officials, 17 June, 19 June and 1 July
2009). Nevertheless, despite the constraints that
they face, or perhaps because of them, municipal
authorities in Rı́o Lagartos and San Felipe have
been more innovative and effective in imple-
menting DRR measures than their colleagues in
medium-sized municipalities (Table 2).
6.1. Risk maps
Risk mapping forms part of a risk assessment,
defined by UN/ISDR as ‘a methodology used to
determine the extent and nature of risk caused
by potential hazards and existing conditions of
vulnerability that could pose a potential threat
or harm to people, property, livelihoods and the
environment on which they depend’ (UN/ISDR,
2004, annex 1). Once hazards, vulnerability and
capacity to reduce risk have been identified and
quantified, mapping can enable the

TABLE 2 DRR performance in case study municipalities

Indicator of performance Felipe Carrillo Puerto Lázaro Cárdenas Rı́o Lagartos San Felipe Tizimı́n

Risk maps Poor Poor Poor Good Poor

By-laws and regulations Poor Poor Poor Poor Poor
Risk communication Fair Poor Very good Very good Fair
Preparedness and evacuations Fair Poor Good Very good Fair
Shelter management Good Fair N/A N/A Good

Very good, all stakeholder groups were impressed with performance; Good, most stakeholders were satisfied or impressed with performance; Fair, some
stakeholders were satisfied and others more critical of performance; Poor, most stakeholders were highly critical of performance; N/A, not applicable.

ENVIRONMENTAL HAZARDS
 162 Wilkinson
identification of high-priority areas for interven-
tion (Trujillo et al., 2000, p. 8).
In Mexico, national and state laws recommend
that municipalities prepare their own risk maps.
Nonetheless, most Civil Protection directors in
the Yucatán peninsula do not have one, despite
the fact that the United Nations Development
Programme (UNDP) has provided training to
produce risk maps (interview, UNDP local promo-
ter, San Felipe, 8 July 2008). In only one of the
case study municipalities, San Felipe, was the
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Civil Protection director using a risk map for plan-
ning purposes. The map identifies the location of
important resources, such as electricity genera-
tors, as well as households with children, disabled
and elderly residents and houses located in areas
prone to flooding. The Civil Protection director
updates the map every year by visiting house-
holds and talking to residents. In the other four
municipalities, former directors had produced
risk maps but they were never used and many
had been lost.
6.2. By-laws and regulations
The Civil Protection by-law is the main legal
instrument available to municipal governments
to incentivize and penalize actions related to
human security. Three of the five case study
municipalities in the Yucatán peninsula have
drafted these regulations, but in only one,
Lázaro Cárdenas, was the by-law published in
the official state gazette. This by-law gives the
municipal Civil Protection department the
power to monitor and inspect safety measures in
private companies and at public events, and to
apply sanctions for non-compliance with these
safety regulations. However, none of the official
or draft by-laws specify measures to be taken or
avoided to reduce the risks associated with hurri-
canes, for example, by requiring businesses to
carry out evacuation drills.
Municipal regulations on other matters, such
as land-use planning and environmental protec-
tion, could be used to mitigate disaster by pre-
venting construction in flood-prone areas, but
ENVIRONMENTAL HAZARDS
none of the five municipalities have these regu-
lations. State and federal governments have eco-
logical land-use planning laws and in both
Quintana Roo and Yucatán these are being
applied to limit the growth of settlements on
the coast, but states and municipalities are
doing little to prevent buildings going up in
flood-prone areas inland.
Building codes should provide standards for
public and private construction and municipali-
ties can develop their own building codes giving
them the power to inspect a construction,
suspend it and even apply sanctions if it does
not comply with these standards (telephone
interview, federal government official, 25
January 2010). Of the five case study municipali-
ties, only Tizimı́n has a building code but stake-
holders commented that this code is difficult to
apply as much low-income housing in urban
and rural areas is informal.
6.3. Risk communication
Communicating with the public is a key aspect of
preparedness as it determines the success of other
measures: people need to know what to do to
protect themselves and their possessions in
anticipation of a hurricane, and be ready to evac-
uate if necessary. In Mexico, an early warning
system for hurricanes was established in 2000 to
standardize alert levels and instructions for popu-
lations living in areas prone to hurricanes (Direc-
ción General de Protección Civil, 2000). One of
the main tasks of municipal Civil Protection is
to provide instructions and advice to the public
on what to do at different stages of alert,
however, how this information is communicated
to the public varies from municipality to munici-
pality. In the small municipalities, Rı́o Lagartos
and San Felipe, Civil Protection directors are able
to make personal visits to communities and com-
municate with residents directly to explain the
early warning system. The larger municipalities,
however, have many towns and villages, some of
which are very remote, making it difficult for gov-
ernment staff to visit them all.
 Why ‘small is beautiful’ in municipal disaster risk reduction 163
In both Rı́o Lagartos and San Felipe, Civil
Protection directors have chosen to coordinate
activities with local promoters of UNDP’s Local
Risk Management Programme. UNDP works
principally at community level helping to set up
emergency committees and draw up risk maps
and emergency plans, but UNDP local promoters
are now also being encouraged to collaborate
with municipal authorities (interview, UNDP pro-
gramme director, Mérida, 7 July 2008). However,
not all Civil Protection directors are equally
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willing to work with UNDP. In Lázaro Cárdenas,
Felipe Carrillo Puerto and Tizimı́n, directors
believe they do not need support because they
have sufficient experience and resources of their
own, and because they have little contact with
UNDP local promoters they are suspicious of
their activities at community level. Conversely,
in San Felipe and Rı́o Lagartos, local promoters
have built a close relationship with Civil
Protection directors. They participate actively in
planning meetings and help disseminate infor-
mation on risk and preparedness.
The larger municipalities also face greater diffi-
culties with the implementation of DRR edu-
cation, to lacking sufficient human resources to
visit and carry out widespread education pro-
grammes in schools. Tizimı́n, for example, has
192 schools but the Civil Protection director has
no other members of staff to help him carry out
talks, just one secretary. Felipe Carrillo Puerto
has 196 schools and six operations staff in Civil
Protection, but the director said that he did not
have adequate human resources to visit all the
schools. Civil Protection directors in the small
municipalities on the other hand have no
problem visiting the 3 or 4 schools in their
jurisdiction.
The municipal government in San Felipe
adopted a particularly innovative approach to
DRR education, integrating it into a broader pro-
gramme of municipal reform. A change of gov-
ernment in 2001 paved the way for changes in
local governance, which have been maintained
over the last 9 years, with a direct impact on the
quality of DRR. Behind these reforms in govern-
ance practices was the vision of one policy
entrepreneur, Municipal President Joaquı́n Dı́az,
who entered office with the objective of building
the image of San Felipe as a clean and prosperous
port. A keystone of this new style of municipal
governance was the Healthy Municipality Pro-
gramme, which involves community members
in activities to prevent diseases such as dengue
by collecting rubbish from their backyards and
cleaning areas where animals live and feed. This
and other development programmes implemented
during the first year of the Dı́az administration all
received extraordinary funds from the state gov-
ernment. These investments allowed the govern-
ment to set in motion a process of development
and improvement before Hurricane Isidore hit,
which turned out to be vital for disaster recovery.
Once Isidore had passed and it was safe to return,
residents, coordinated by the Civil Protection
director, collectively removed the debris and
rubbish from the town, beaches and mangrove
areas and helped restore basic services. The interest
in keeping San Felipe clean prompted a quick
response and reduced the spread of disease (inter-
views, UNDP local promoter and residents, San
Felipe, 8 July and 9 July 2008).
6.4. Preparedness and evacuations
According to Civil Protection legislation in Quin-
tana Roo (2009, art. 20) and Yucatán (1999, arts.
65 – 70), the State Civil Protection Council has
the authority to declare a state of alert when a
hurricane is approaching and can order the eva-
cuation of populations to previously assigned
temporary shelters. The army provides assistance
through its emergency plan DN-III, offering
vehicles and personnel to carry out evacuations,
rescuing victims and setting up kitchens in shel-
ters in the main towns.
Governments in all five municipalities have
faced difficulties coordinating evacuations;
however, in San Felipe, and to a lesser extent Rı́o
Lagartos, municipal authorities learned lessons
from their mistakes, improved policies and are
now able to coordinate preparedness activities
and evacuations so effectively that they barely
ENVIRONMENTAL HAZARDS
 164 Wilkinson
need assistance from the army or state auth-
orities. In San Felipe, the Civil Protection director
admitted that mistakes had been made in prepa-
redness planning and coordination of evacua-
tions before Hurricane Isidore, particularly in
the way people were treated during the evacua-
tions (interview, municipal official, San Felipe, 9
July 2008). Residents were reluctant to leave and
many were forced out by the army during the hur-
ricane. They were unprepared and important
assets, including boats and fishing equipment,
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were damaged. Municipal authorities realized
that they needed to improve their relationship
with residents and raise awareness of hurricane
risk throughout the year, so that at the start of
the hurricane season people would already
know what to do to prepare and feel more comfor-
table leaving their homes.
Since Isidore, Civil Protection authorities in
San Felipe and Rı́o Lagartos have focused on
building trust with communities. They do this
by visiting communities, giving talks and invol-
ving civil society groups in DRR planning and
implementation. Local fishing cooperatives, for
example, take part in Civil Protection Committee
meetings and because of their links with the com-
munity, ‘they can go back and advise their
members on how to prepare, how to protect
their engines and secure their boats and houses’
(interview, municipal government official, San
Felipe, 10 July 2008). Civil Protection directors
in these municipalities also rely heavily on the
support of fishing cooperatives, farming associ-
ations, collective landowners (ejidatarios), volun-
teer groups (brigadas) and local NGOs to identify
vulnerable groups and help them to prepare and
evacuate.
As a result of these efforts, residents in Rı́o
Lagartos and San Felipe today are more willing
to evacuate and some said they are happy to
leave on their own even when they think the hur-
ricane will not be very strong or will not cause a
lot of damage. Before Hurricane Wilma made
landfall on 21 October 2005, all residents in Rı́o
Lagartos and San Felipe were evacuated to neigh-
bouring municipalities, even though the hurri-
cane did not hit these municipalities directly.
ENVIRONMENTAL HAZARDS
In the other three municipalities, evacuation
policies have been broadly effective in coastal
areas, but less so in the interior, where residents
are more reluctant to evacuate, even those
living in flood-prone areas, because they lack
information about who should leave and where
they should go and do not feel secure abandoning
their homes. Lázaro Cárdenas and Tizimı́n were
hit directly by Hurricane Wilma, and Felipe Car-
rillo Puerto by Hurricane Dean, and in all three
municipalities preparedness and evacuation
measures were criticized for being poorly commu-
nicated and disorganized. In Felipe Carrillo
Puerto, preparedness before Hurricane Dean was
affected by political conflict between municipal
and state governments, run by different political
parties. Municipal authorities claimed to have
faced difficulties accessing state resources for
infrastructure projects, and when these funds
failed to materialize, resources were taken away
from Civil Protection and other departments.
With no budget for fuel and no operations staff,
the Civil Protection director was unable to visit
all the communities and alert people before Hur-
ricane Dean or check the village halls used as tem-
porary refuges in rural areas. In the absence of
clear instructions, most people stayed in their vil-
lages and some used the refuges, but these were ill
equipped and many of them flooded.
In Lázaro Cárdenas, preparedness and evacua-
tion measures were poorly coordinated and many
people were trapped in their houses for days after
Hurricane Wilma without sufficient food, water
and other essentials. Slow, inefficient distribution
of aid and lack of communication with the public
prompted outbreaks of violence, and the state gov-
ernment took over, sending in security officials to
control the situation and Civil Protection staff to
coordinate relief efforts. Notwithstanding these
mistakes, municipal authorities in Lázaro Cárdenas
were reluctant to accept responsibility.
6.5. Shelter management
The organization and quality of temporary shelters
in the main towns have improved in all three
 Why ‘small is beautiful’ in municipal disaster risk reduction 165
medium-sized municipalities. Temporary shelters
are public buildings in the main towns inland
assigned to house people evacuated before a hurri-
cane. As the main towns in San Felipe and Rı́o
Lagartos are on the coast, these municipalities do
not have their own shelters so residents are taken
to neighbouring Tizimı́n. All stakeholders agreed
that the shelters in Felipe Carrillo Puerto and
Tizimı́n were well organized and well stocked. In
Lázaro Cárdenas, however, stakeholders com-
plained about the quality of the bathrooms, lack
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of food and having to sleep on the floor during
Hurricane Wilma (2005). The hurricane took 3
days to pass over the municipality and municipal
authorities were unprepared for this; hence the
shelters were understocked. Overall, however,
management of the temporary shelters in these
municipalities has been made easier by the fact
that some families living in coastal areas have
bought a second home inland, or rent one at the
start of hurricane season, so fewer people need
attending to.
7. Explanation of results
DRR measures in all five municipalities improved
between 1998 and 2008, although performance
has been uneven. Rı́o Lagartos and San Felipe
would appear to be disadvantaged in terms of
size and yet they were able to develop more effec-
tive policies than larger municipalities with
similar exposure to hurricanes. A number of
factors help account for these differences in per-
formance and are discussed below.
7.1. Community participation
One of the most noticeable differences between
the small- and medium-sized municipalities in
this study is the willingness of municipal auth-
orities to encourage civil society participation in
DRR planning and implementation. Municipal
Civil Protection committees are usually made
up of representatives from different public
agencies, but small municipalities have few
departments and directors, nevertheless, they
make up for, this human capacity constraint by
inviting a range of non-government stakeholders
to take part and coordinate efforts. For example,
boat engines are a valuable productive asset and
need to be taken out of the water and moved to
a storeroom further inland, requiring collabor-
ation between the fishers and the farming associ-
ation, which owns the storeroom. By relying on
other organizations to provide human and organ-
izational resources, Civil Protection authorities in
small municipalities have been able to overcome
some of the financial and human capacity con-
straints they face.
Regular contact with communities has proved
particularly beneficial for communicating risk
and contributed to the success of preparedness
and evacuation measures in San Felipe and Rı́o
Lagartos. In San Felipe in particular, the Civil Pro-
tection director is well respected because of this
personal contact and visits to communities has
improved people’s understanding of what is
expected of them in an emergency. They are
therefore more likely to pay attention to instruc-
tions when it comes to preparedness and evacua-
tions. Ironically, Civil Protection directors in the
larger municipalities have shown the least will-
ingness to work with civil society organizations,
even though they have larger populations and
many more remote communities to attend to,
and so are in greater need of support to reach
these residents and communicate risk and risk
reduction measures.
In Lázaro Cárdenas, coordination of evacua-
tions before Hurricane Wilma was particularly
ineffective because of poor communication. Civil
society organizations were not invited to Civil
Protection meetings and although UNDP was
working in a number of communities around the
municipality, local promoters had a difficult job
coordinating with municipal authorities. Civil
Protection authorities based in the main town of
Kantunilkı́n spent little time in rural areas in the
months leading up to Hurricane Wilma, and so
were unfamiliar with the characteristics and vul-
nerabilities of different communities. This lack of
communication and participation helps explain
ENVIRONMENTAL HAZARDS
 166 Wilkinson
why official preparedness and evacuation policies
proved so ineffective before Hurricane Wilma.
7.2. Social capital
Municipal authorities in San Felipe have been
able to develop more effective DRR measures
thanks to the social bonds, based on friendship
and kinship, that exist in the municipality,
referred to as ‘bonding social capital’ (Adger,
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2003). These high levels of bonding social
capital can be seen in collective efforts to deal
with the problem of decline in fisheries (Chuen-
pagdee et al., 2002; Fraga, 2006). Fishers in San
Felipe created a marine reserve in 1988 and have
been managing it ever since, without receiving
official recognition from the state or the federal
government (Fraga, 2006, p. 294). These social
bonds help community members to cope with
disaster in the absence of government support,
but by harnessing social capital, local authorities
can do more, in partnership with civil society, to
reduce disaster risk. In San Felipe, this has been
made possible because of high levels of ‘network-
ing social capital’ (Adger, 2003). These bonds of
trust and reciprocity between community
members and the government have developed
over time. Municipal authorities have fully sup-
ported the marine reserve and helped facilitate
community decision making about manage-
ment, proving themselves to be fair in the appli-
cation and monitoring of fishing bans (Fraga,
2006). As a result, community members are
happy to participate in public affairs, including
preparedness planning.
Networking social capital appears to be less
strong elsewhere, including neighbouring Rı́o
Lagartos, which is located inside a federal nature
reserve. Residents are not involved in manage-
ment of the reserve; hence they have difficulty in
understanding the principles and applying the
rules and this has created social conflict within
the community and between residents and
municipal authorities (Fraga, 2006). Citizens of
Rı́o Lagartos are therefore generally less inclined
to participate in Civil Protection planning
ENVIRONMENTAL HAZARDS
meetings, and this explains why stakeholder
evaluations of preparedness and response were
less positive than in San Felipe.
7.3. Intergovernmental relations
Most studies of local policy reform focus on the
characteristics and performance of local insti-
tutions, ignoring the influence that institutional
arrangements and relationships at different gov-
ernance scales might have (Andersson and
Ostrom, 2008). In Mexico, the relationship
between municipal and state governments is par-
ticularly critical for DRR because of centrist and
paternalistic tendencies in Mexican public
administration and in the structures and oper-
ation of the Civil Protection system.
To develop appropriate DRR policies, munici-
pal governments need to have autonomy from
higher levels of government; however, in
Mexico this autonomy is severely limited
because of fiscal and political subjugation to the
state government (Cabrero Mendoza and
Carrera Hernández, 2004; Edmonds-Poli, 2006;
Grindle, 2007). Political reform since the 1980s
has altered state2municipal relations but pater-
nalistic state practices have not entirely disap-
peared. Such is the case in the State of Quintana
Roo, which continues to be governed by the
Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), which
dominated Mexico for 50 years. The state govern-
ment of Quintana Roo is keen to intervene
directly to help its municipalities, particularly
those with few resources, such as Lázaro Cárde-
nas. State Civil Protection authorities dominate
preparedness planning meetings in Lázaro Cárde-
nas and when the municipality was hit by Hurri-
cane Wilma and municipal authorities were
unable to respond efficiently, the state was
quick to intervene to restore law and order and
take over response and recovery functions.
Because of this state paternalism, the election of
an opposition party at municipal level creates
problems for local governance. The state govern-
ment is unaccustomed to working with opposi-
tion governments, and where this has occurred,
 Why ‘small is beautiful’ in municipal disaster risk reduction 167
it has produced political tension and constrained
progress on DRR. In the State of Yucatán, on the
other hand, the political map has been changing
continually over the last 10 years, so state auth-
orities are used to dealing with municipal presi-
dents of different political parties who respond to
different interests. As a result, state authorities
are less paternalistic towards their municipalities.
State2municipal government relations are
also likely to be affected by the number of muni-
cipalities a state has. Yucatán has 106 municipali-
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ties; too many for the State Civil Protection
Department to be directly involved in each. The
state’s relationship with its municipalities has
therefore been far less political and intervention-
ist when it comes to DRR than in Quintana Roo,
which has only nine municipalities. Less direct
intervention has allowed poorer municipalities
in the State of Yucatán greater freedom to select
and apply appropriate measures to reduce risks
from hurricanes.
7.4. Political spaces and policy entrepreneurs
Political change can be an important catalyst for
DRR reform. Of all five case study municipalities,
the four that have seen the greatest improve-
ments in DRR practices, have all had political
parties other than the PRI governing them at
some point. In Rı́o Lagartos, organization of
DRR activities gradually improved while the PRI
was still in power, but the willingness of govern-
ment to coordinate with civil society increased
dramatically when a non-PRI government was
elected for the first time in 2007. In San Felipe,
reforms took place much earlier. A change of gov-
ernment in 2001 paved the way for local govern-
ance reform which has been maintained over the
last 9 years, and this has had a direct impact on
the quality of DRR measures. Behind these gov-
ernance reforms was the vision of a policy entre-
preneur, municipal president Joaquı́n Dı́az. Dı́az
entered office with the objective of building the
image of San Felipe as a clean and prosperous
port (interview, municipal government official,
San Felipe, 9 July 2008). A keystone of this new
strategy was the Healthy Municipality Pro-
gramme, which Dı́az used to involve citizens in
a range of activities to clean up the town, raise
awareness of health issues affecting coastal areas
and give residents a sense of pride in their com-
munity. This in turn spurred a more efficient dis-
aster response after Hurricane Isidore, as residents
wanted their community to be clean again as
quickly as possible. This public awareness initiat-
ive created a greater understanding of the risks
associated with hurricanes that went beyond
issues of personal safety and built on a growing
sense of pride and expectation of progress in the
community (Figure 3).
To implement these programmes, the munici-
pal government needed external financial and
technical support. Here again, Dı́az promoted
innovative local governance practices, accessing
state, private sector and NGO resources to help
pay for infrastructure investments, support recov-
ery after Isidore and implement environmental
and community development projects around
the municipality.
The case of San Felipe suggests that vision of a
policy entrepreneur is critical in the early stages
of DRR reform. Although Dı́az was not focused
disaster per se, he promoted a broader shift in
local governance practices, encouraging commu-
nity participation in municipal affairs, which gen-
erated more effective DRR practices. Since the end
of the Dı́az administration, civil society groups
have continued to participate in preparedness
because social expectations have been raised.
Thus, improvements initiated under Dı́az are
likely to continue.
7.5. Limits to DRR reform
Despite improvements in many aspects of DRR,
there remain a number of constraints on further
progress in all five municipalities. Risk communi-
cation, preparedness and evacuation measures
have gone a long way towards reducing the phys-
ical damage and social disruption associated with
hurricanes, particularly in San Felipe and Rı́o
Lagartos, but arguably, these communities have
ENVIRONMENTAL HAZARDS
 168 Wilkinson
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FIGURE 3 San Felipe in 2005, three years after Hurricane
Isidore
Source: Author’s photograph.
become over-reliant on evacuations as a pre-
emptive strategy. Every time there is a hurricane
warning, the whole community has to be evacu-
ated even if the warning ends up being a false
alarm. This is costly for the government and
households, and despite careful organization,
some assets will be left behind and may be
damaged or stolen. Risk communication, prepa-
redness, evacuations and shelter management
can therefore be seen as necessary, but not sufficient,
measures to reduce disaster risk. In order to
implement more costly, far-reaching DRR
measures, such as reducing exposure to hurricanes
through land-use planning and housing resettle-
ment, municipalities of all sizes will require
further external support.
8. Discussion
Small municipalities in Mexico are believed to
face disadvantages because of their dependence
on intergovernmental transfers and low levels of
funding for public services (Rowland, 2001).
However, this does not appear to present a
serious problem for certain aspects of DRR. Far
from being disadvantaged, municipalities with
small or more concentrated populations would
appear to have some advantages over larger
ones, particularly when it comes to
ENVIRONMENTAL HAZARDS
communicating risk and coordinating evacua-
tions. These aspects of DRR can be considered as
special types of public services because their effec-
tiveness depends more on ongoing communi-
cation between government and civil society
than the level of funding. DRR measures will fail
if government is not perceived to be competent
by community members or if the level of trust
between government and communities is low.
In particular, residents are unlikely to respond
to information and take protective measures if
they have little confidence in government
(Wisner et al., 2004; Basolo et al., 2009). In
small municipalities, governments may find it
easier to build trust with communities by visiting
them regularly and communicating with resi-
dents directly, while in larger municipalities,
direct contact is less feasible and this makes resi-
dents more sceptical about government pro-
grammes. Governments in small municipalities
with fewer resources may also look to build part-
nerships with civil society organizations, and
although this may be more out of necessity than
desire in the first instance, the improvements in
DRR that occur as a result should make them
recognize the benefits of engaging with
communities.
Notwithstanding the limitations posed by a
lack of resources, small municipalities are able
to achieve more by focusing on measures with
multiplier effects, such as education programmes
and communications strategies to raise awareness
of hurricanes and how to prepare. These measures
are inexpensive but have the advantage of
encouraging autonomous actions by families to
protect lives and property. Not all DRR measures
are considered municipal government responsi-
bilities, but if they can, through their actions,
promote additional autonomous measures then
the DRR will be more effective.
Beyond the internal characteristics of the
municipality, including size, however, are a
series of institutional factors shaping municipal
DRR. Small- and medium-sized municipalities in
Mexico have limited resources to implement
effective DRR policies so they need support from
higher levels of government and other external
 Why ‘small is beautiful’ in municipal disaster risk reduction 169
actors, but there is a fine balance between support
and paternalism. Local governments also need to
have sufficient autonomy from higher levels of
government so that they can define their own pri-
orities and implement DRR measures without too
much interference, and thus gain credibility and
trust from their citizens. This kind of autonomous,
inclusive style of governance, so important for
DRR, is not the modus operandi of most local gov-
ernments in the developing world, but decentrali-
zation and political reform may create new spaces
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for policy entrepreneurs to innovate and improve
policies and practices to reduce disaster risk.
8.1. Putting DRR policy into practice
DRR research and policies can be more effectively
implemented if the capacities of local governments
are well understood, including their relationships
with other stakeholders. Financial resources are
important but they are not a panacea for effective
DRR; local governments also need to develop
inclusive approaches to planning and implemen-
tation and favourable relationships with higher
levels of government, NGOs and the private
sector, as these actors also have important roles to
play. Local government cannot act alone, but it
plays a critical role because it is in a unique, stra-
tegic position to coordinate and support commu-
nity efforts and access necessary resources from
external sources to reduce risk. DRR strategies
take time to implement and in the early stages,
when local governments are learning about how
to coordinate disaster preparedness and response
activities, institutional and geographical proximity
to vulnerable groups is particularly important.
Although annual municipal budgets may be suffi-
cient to carry out these functions, municipalities
will nevertheless need to access extraordinary
funds for ‘upstream’ measures, such as the con-
struction of protective infrastructure, and will
require technical support to develop appropriate
legal instruments for DRR, such as land-use plan-
ning regulations.
To have the greatest impact, external support
to municipalities, small and large, should help
them to build on evolving strategies, particularly
those with multiplier effects. It should also focus
on creating an enabling inter-institutional
environment, so that local authorities have the
political space and support they need to develop
their own innovative solutions to reducing disas-
ter risk.
Acknowledgements
The author would like to thank the anonymous
reviewers for their helpful comments and sugges-
tions to improve this paper. Dr Emily Wilkinson’s
thesis ‘Decentralised disaster management: local
governance, institutional learning and reducing
risk from hurricanes in the Yucatán peninsula,
Mexico’ was funded by the UK Economic and
Social Research Council.
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