Lessons in the Elections for Emergency Management

I voted today, and from all indications, so did the vast majority of the rest of the country. No matter who you voted for, I hope you were able to vote. In Michigan, for example, the prediction is currently at 70%! The potentially record-breaking voter turnout shows, in part, that voter apathy was overcome.

How does that matter to emergency management?

First, it shows that apathy can be overcome. There is apathy in the public, the natural human instinct to ignore all the warnings, to tell yourself "it will never happen to me." I just finished reading "The Unthinkable: Who Survives When Disaster Strikes - and Why" by Amanda Ripley. (This is an excellent book, I highly recommend.) It helps explain why people think the way they do about personal emergency preparedness. Your local Joe Emergency Manager needs to understand how the political campaigns work (and don't work) and apply those lessons to areas such as public education on emergency management.

Second, it also has lessons for organizational education. There are many an emergency manager out there who has fought the battle with their leadership over the priotity of the emergency management program. (Free plug for EM Forum: Leadership Challenges in Emergency Management - A Moderated Panel Discussion is the topic of the day tomorrow at noon ET, go to www.emforum.org for more information.) How someone goes about getting elected has direct application to how an emergency manager gains support for their program.

Finally, it leads to the discussion of politics and the emergency manager. I would argue that a good emergency manager is apolitical, i.e., politically neutral. Of course politics affects us and how we do our job. The politics of the organization definitely affect the program. Some of the emergency management program goals could be aligned with a political viewpoint. Certainly we have our own political viewpoints. Still, you need to be politically neutral to be truly effective. After all, the point is to take care of ALL of the organization and ultimately ALL of the public.
To be clear, you need to be aware and engaged, and you need to deal with the politics, but the minute you align yourself with a political viewpoint, you have boxed yourself into a corner. (Check out Disaster Policy and Politics: Emergency Management and Homeland Security by Richard Sylves, University of Delaware for another viewpoint.)