Social media in risk perception and disaster management: a geographical perspective

The advent of the last Technological Revolution has completely upset long-entrenched relations among spaces, places and communication flows, by influencing the ways through which information is territorialized and, vice versa, territories are (re)shaped in the virtual dimension. In particular, the internet and the social web have further accelerated the increase in geo-tagged data which are co-created by not professional users. The increasing co-production of space-related information has also influenced risk perception and disaster management. On the one hand, a huge increase in disaster-related data flows diffused by institutional actors is due to a variegated range of purposes (prevention, on-site disaster management, real-time information). On the other hand, a significant amount of data is co-created and shared by users from the bottom-up while the disaster crisis is still unfolding, by integrating official informational sources. Theoretically inserted at the intersection between the Geography of Communication and the Geography of disaster, the chapter provides a theoretical review and a set of descriptive examples demonstrating the growingly pervasive role of ICTs in risk perception and management.