Lessons of Disaster is a natural follow-up to the author's previous book, After Disaster (1997), which examined the extent to which disasters and accidents influence policy agendas within relevant domains. Lessons of Disaster is built on this previous work but focuses specifically on whether or not disasters, as focusing events, induce policy learning. The author differentiates between simple policy change and actual policy learning by defining learning as a process by which policy actors incorporate new information and insights revealed by a disaster and purposefully apply it to the design of more appropriate or effective policies. The author also differentiates between three distinct types of learning—a typology originally developed by Peter May (“Policy Learning and Failure,” Journal of Public Policy 12 [no. 4, 1992]: 331–54). The first is instrumental learning, which is learning about the viability of policy interventions or implementation designs. Such learning concerns the appropriateness or effectiveness of a policy intervention in the face of a well-defined objective. The second is social policy learning, which involves learning about the social construction of a policy or problem. For example, before the event of 9/11, terrorism was defined primarily as a criminal justice issue, whereas the experiences of 9/11 helped redefine terrorism as a homeland security issue associated with acts of war. Finally, political learning relates to the development of more sophisticated policy advocacy strategies. For all of these categories, learning applies to individuals. However, nonhuman entities such as organizations can be said to “learn” inasmuch as learning individuals within them are able to steer the organization in new directions.

The book's conceptual model of disaster-related policy learning draws appropriate elements from well-established policy change literature, including Sabatier's Advocacy Coalition Framework (see Paul Sabatier, “An Advocacy Coalition Framework of Policy Change and Policy Learning Therein,” Policy Sciences 21 [Fall, 1988]: 129–68), Baumgartner and Jones' Punctuated Equilibrium Theory (see Frank Baumgartner and Bryan Jones, Agendas and Instability in American Politics, 1993), and Kingdon's streams metaphors (John Kingdon, Agendas, Alternatives and Public Policies, 2d ed., 1995). The discussion and inclusion of these familiar approaches creates for the reader an easy transition to the author's own model.

The book's model of policy learning has six propositions, summarized briefly as follows: 1) policy actors are purposeful and want to address or solve problems revealed by a focusing event; 2) only unusually disastrous focusing events will gain much attention; 3) group mobilization is temporally linked to a particular focusing event (i.e., an event occurs thereby actuating groups); 4) group mobilization is accompanied by an increase in discussion of policy ideas, including theories about causes and potential solutions; 5) there is a relationship between ideas and policy change (policy learning generally excludes unreflective copying and action for the sake of action); and 6) it is possible for learning to decay over time.

The author examines the evidence for policy learning primarily through the passage of legislation, congressional witness testimony, and media attention in four policy domains that are particularly prone to disaster. He organizes these domains into three case studies, each with a separate chapter: 1) domestic terror attacks (with 9/11 as the primary focusing event), 2) aviation security (again with a special focus on 9/11), and 3) earthquake and hurricane policy. In addition to policy learning analysis, each chapter offers a satisfying recent historical background of the policy domain. Just the right amount of attention is given to the background material—it stays focused, keeping the reader up to date on these policy areas, and does not go too far back in history, nor does it confuse the reader with excessive testimony. The chapters also configure data in clear and concise charts and figures.

One minor criticism is that the conclusions related to his policy learning analyses are not always clear—the reader is sometimes left wondering if policy learning occurred or not. However, it seems likely that this is because, in reality, the difference between ad hoc policy responses and genuine learning (insofar as it satisfies the author's strict definitional conditions) is sometimes difficult to determine, rather than a problem with the author's perspicuity. Another related challenge is the fact that policy learning in the selected domains (although it may occur) is not necessarily reflected in the model presented in the first chapter. In particular, due to the nature of these domains (which generally lack multiple concentrated interests and are dominated by those with scientific expertise), group mobilization may not occur or may only occur within already embedded organizations (i.e., “inside mobilization”). The author is aware of this fact and explains that, compared with other disaster prone domains, such as nuclear power and oil spills, “in the domains addressed in this book, mobilization occurs among a much narrower group of actors. As we have seen, all four domains engage ‘policies without publics’ ” (p. 164).

Nevertheless, the author finds evidence of some policy learning, following focusing events, in all domains—although to differing degrees in each. In the terrorism domain, major instrumental (legislation) and social policy learning (problem definition and causal narratives) took place soon after 9/11. However, many of the “new” policy instruments were taken from the shelves of previous commissions and policy entrepreneurs a la Kingdon's policy streams process. The aviation security domain experienced similar changes, as the primary focus shifted from bombs to hijacking and, moreover, shifted “from treating aviation security as the domain of the transportation sector to seeing it as a national security problem with national consequences for policy design and implementation.” Learning in the earthquake and hurricane domains has tended to follow a somewhat different path. In these domains, focusing events do not appear to have a robust effect on learning. Rather, learning is more incremental, perhaps due to political-institutional factors that include the distributive nature (and political value) of disaster relief in the federal government, the relocation of the Federal Emergency Management Agency within the Department of Homeland Security, and the fact that few groups have an incentive to lobby for policy change at the federal level.

This is a valuable book for students of disaster policy and for students of policy change more generally. The author makes it clear what is and is not demonstrable through this study and also makes appropriate suggestions for further research. Lessons of Disaster is perhaps slightly more suitable for policy academics rather than practitioners. However, after reading this book, it is hard not to become an advocate for aggressive disaster mitigation, as opposed to the preponderant paradigm of disaster relief.