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Disasters in the Anthropocene: A Storm in a Teacup?

Dramatic alterations to the natural environment by human activity have produced a permanent rupture in the earth system; the relative stable epoch of the Holocene has given way to a volatile Anthropocene. Accepting these claims mean that we now live in this altered physical reality, inviting us to rethink how we conceptualize disasters. Yet disaster scholars have been hesitant to apply the Anthropocene label and acknowledge the profound changes it can bring to the study of disasters. This article asks if this label is a necessary adage or unnecessary baggage for disaster studies by examining the possibilities and challenges of engaging with the Anthropocene. An analysis of the concepts, causes and consequences of disasters reveals how the Anthropocene provides, as the very least, a theoretical heuristic for challenging linear temporal assumptions, the epistemological status of uncertainty and the location of agency in disaster studies.