14 Leveraging Youth Engagement in Disaster Risk Reduction Through Science …
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health, there were examples where a student being recognized as a symbol of awareness. A similar approach can be done as part of national safe school and disaster
education strategies. One potential reason is because the safe school initiative has
better leverage and visibility in the eyes of policymakers. In both 2015 and 2016 of
DRR month in Indonesia (October), there was no specific policy and practical discussions on youth engagement in DRR, but more on safe school or safe hospital. The
DRR month recognized the scout movement as DRR education agents that actively
conduct self-assessment at schools located in disaster-prone areas. However, as our
446 participants suggest, only 2 scout members actually participated in the C&Y
Forum during WCDRR, and upon re-interview with them, it is known that the mainstream DRR programs were unknown to scout movement. Although such a notion
has been echoed for quite sometimes, relying on scout could not ensure all-schools
implementation of DRR. Instead, it is the potential to include scout as prerequisite
elements strategies for ensuring disaster education and school safety in all schools
(Bisri and Sakurai 2017).
In summary, even though recently there is greater attention from Ministry of
Youth and BNPB/BPBDs, youth are still simply considered as (1) targets of training
programs, particularly due to the need of extending arm of the government in emergency response, e.g., Tagana, and (2) agents of risk communications instead of the
actors of disaster risk reduction. Youth has not been considered as strategic partners
in guiding DRR-related policy and formulation of national/local strategies. There is
no national or local mapping to genuinely understand the potential of youth for DRR
and strategically build partnerships with youth on DRR implementation. Accordingly, one may want to adopt the past advocacy strategies, which put CSOs having
a greater role in providing social services. Furthermore, in recent years CSOs no
longer just provide services to people that the government has failed to reach, but
they are now far more in the mainstream of development activities (Mulyasari and
Shaw 2014).
14.6.2 Youth Engagement in DRR: Does Indonesian
Institutional Setup Provides Room for Engagement?
In this section, we explore and identify whether there is room for youth to make a
significant contribution under the institutional setup related to disaster management
and youth development in Indonesia. In general, opportunities to leverage engagement of youth in DRR exist under several national-level policies. Some opportunities
are yet unexplored, and there is a disconnection between the two most relevant policies that could act as an enabler for such matter––disaster management policy, which
mainly coordinated through the National Disaster Management Agency (BNPB) and
youth development policy, which was mainly developed by the Ministry of Youth
and Sports (Kemenpora). This is somewhat similar with the challenge of partialconnection of disaster management and education policy domains where despite
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health, there were examples where a student being recognized as a symbol of awareness. A similar approach can be done as part of national safe school and disaster
education strategies. One potential reason is because the safe school initiative has
better leverage and visibility in the eyes of policymakers. In both 2015 and 2016 of
DRR month in Indonesia (October), there was no specific policy and practical discussions on youth engagement in DRR, but more on safe school or safe hospital. The
DRR month recognized the scout movement as DRR education agents that actively
conduct self-assessment at schools located in disaster-prone areas. However, as our
446 participants suggest, only 2 scout members actually participated in the C&Y
Forum during WCDRR, and upon re-interview with them, it is known that the mainstream DRR programs were unknown to scout movement. Although such a notion
has been echoed for quite sometimes, relying on scout could not ensure all-schools
implementation of DRR. Instead, it is the potential to include scout as prerequisite
elements strategies for ensuring disaster education and school safety in all schools
(Bisri and Sakurai 2017).
In summary, even though recently there is greater attention from Ministry of
Youth and BNPB/BPBDs, youth are still simply considered as (1) targets of training
programs, particularly due to the need of extending arm of the government in emergency response, e.g., Tagana, and (2) agents of risk communications instead of the
actors of disaster risk reduction. Youth has not been considered as strategic partners
in guiding DRR-related policy and formulation of national/local strategies. There is
no national or local mapping to genuinely understand the potential of youth for DRR
and strategically build partnerships with youth on DRR implementation. Accordingly, one may want to adopt the past advocacy strategies, which put CSOs having
a greater role in providing social services. Furthermore, in recent years CSOs no
longer just provide services to people that the government has failed to reach, but
they are now far more in the mainstream of development activities (Mulyasari and
Shaw 2014).
14.6.2 Youth Engagement in DRR: Does Indonesian
Institutional Setup Provides Room for Engagement?
In this section, we explore and identify whether there is room for youth to make a
significant contribution under the institutional setup related to disaster management
and youth development in Indonesia. In general, opportunities to leverage engagement of youth in DRR exist under several national-level policies. Some opportunities
are yet unexplored, and there is a disconnection between the two most relevant policies that could act as an enabler for such matter––disaster management policy, which
mainly coordinated through the National Disaster Management Agency (BNPB) and
youth development policy, which was mainly developed by the Ministry of Youth
and Sports (Kemenpora). This is somewhat similar with the challenge of partialconnection of disaster management and education policy domains where despite