Seismic risk perception in a Muslim Community:a case study from Agadir, Morocco

By Thomas R. Paradise, Ph.D.------------------------------University of Arkansas

Department of Geosciences and theKing Fahd Center for Middle East & Islamic Studies

Fayetteville, AR USA 72701paradise@uark.edu

“Disasters have spread throughout the land and sea, because of what people have committed.He lets them taste the consequences of their works, so that they may return (to the right way)”

(Qur‘an 30:21)

In 1960 along the coast of southern Morocco, Agadir was a quiet and prosperous

fishing town that was beginning to emerge as a perfect tourist destination for North

Africans and Europeans. Known for its pleasant and

moderate year-round climate with cool misty mornings

and warm, clear afternoons along a twenty-mile sandy

beach, Agadir was becoming the ideal location for a

stay at the beach. Then shortly before midnight on

February 29, 1960, this seaside town was hit by two

moderate earthquakes (RM:5.7-5.9) that devastated

the city, rocked the countryside and killed 15,000

people -- one third of the city’s population at the time!

Now more than forty years later, the once-sleepy seaside resort town is a prime

tourist destination with a beach lined with luxurious international hotels and resorts, an

international airport, noisy, moped-clogged boulevards, 21,000 hotel beds, more than

four million visitor bed-nights each year and a growing population of more than one half

million residents (in 1995). In fact, a new hotel and marina complex is planned for

area of Agadirdestroyed

Kasbah

beach resort a rea

a tourist poster from the 1950s

construction along the beach’s northern end costing more than 65 million dollars – all

atop the fault that shifted in 1960 devastating most of the city!

How a destroyed city can redesign and rebuild itself is often in part a function of

how that community perceives itself as a physical space, a social unit, and a holistic

group. Since the 1960 earthquakes and destruction, little of the city’s architecture

remains to remind its residents of its destructive past and potentially dangerous future.

With the city located atop a major fault corridor and a documented history of high

earthquake frequency, Agadir will one day experience more moderate to high

magnitude earthquakes.

This paper assesses the recall and perception of some of Agadir’s residents in

the hopes of understanding the general sense of seismic risk and hazard in a Muslim

region within its social and cultural context.

STUDY SITE

Located at 30oN, 9oW, Agadir occupies the northern end of a large, crescent

shaped beige-sand beach near the coastal Moroccan border with the Western Sahara,

sitting between the western edge of the Atlas and Anti-Atlas Mountains and the large,

fertile plain of the Sousse Valley. The City of Agadir occupies a series of coastal

terraces that step gently to the sea with the towering Mountain of the Kasbah to the

northwest and the sprawling beach and dune complex to the south.

Previously known as Santa Cruz de Aguer, Agadir was established in 1503 as a

Portuguese colony, fishing village, and a hilltop fortress. The old city was once located

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atop its north flanking mountaintop hill (the Kasbah), but once the fortress was later

strengthened with monumental batteries and walls by Emanuel, the King of Portugal,

the City relocated to the beach terraces below the cliffs of the Kasbah along the sandy

beach. Then in 1536, the City was attacked and taken by the Moors, removing the

Portuguese administration and colonists to this day (Mathews 1881).

During the four hundred years that followed, Agadir was sleepy seaside city

known as an outstanding port and fishing center, a gateway into the Atlas Wilderness

and Moroccan Interior, and as a prosperous agricultural region and major trading post

for exporting spices, olive oil, sugar cane, and gold. In 1911, at the height of the

colonial rivalry between France and Germany in Morocco, Germany sent the warship

Panther into the Bay of Agadir causing an international incident that nearly precipitated

an European war, but lead to the establishment of the French protectorate in Morocco.

It was then in 1913, that the French built the modern port facility and made it a booming,

influential city in Morocco. It was because of its port, strategic location, and the

agricultural resources that the French, Spanish, Arab and Portuguese settled in Agadir,

contributing to the City’s accelerated growth.

Until the disastrous

earthquake on February 29,

1960, Agadir was the largest

populated city in the South

Region. After which the city of

Taroudant replaced Agadir as

the largest city in the region

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until 1971 when it was again the largest city as a result of the international and national

programs to rebuild and revitalize the region. Agadir continued to grow with renewed

and increased tourism once the perceived threat of further earthquakes had passed

(Erickson & Young 1992). Before the disaster, Agadir’s population was 33,000 (AISI

1962), but with estimated deaths of 15,000 and an equal number of injured in addition to

a mass exodus, the City was left devastated and nearly abandoned.

Once rebuilding the city was organized, it was initially planned to only

accommodate only the original 33,000 people (Findlay 1985). But by 1977, the

population had grown to 95,000 (Barrett et. al. 1991) and is still increasing; in 1985, it

had reached 150,000 inhabitants and by 1994 Agadir’s population had grown to exceed

one half million people (Fayad 1993). Agadir’s growth was attributed to a severe

drought in 1981 throughout southern Morocco that forced thousand of farmers to move

into the city to seek new opportunities, and increased revenues from tourism, fishing,

and export industries attracting a new work force of migrants (Findlay 1985, Erickson &

Young 1992). Moreover, as these three industries increase, Agadir’s population in 2010

has been estimated at more than 2 million people (Barrett et. al. 1991)!

Agadir is a popular destination for domestic and international tourists, which

makes tourism the region’s primary revenue generator as well as the biggest single

tourism revenue contributor to the Moroccan economy. Morocco was recently ranked

as the twenty-third most popular global tourist destination (Vitalis 1995) and has the

second highest number of hotel beds in any one city in Morocco (MMEFPT 2002).

Morocco’s tourism sector earned approximately 1.8 billion USD in 1999 and tourism

increased by 4.5 percent from 1980 to 2000 (MC 2002).

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Large investments are currently fueling resort projects throughout Agadir

including a large-scale resort complex including a marina, a hotel with 250 rooms, 160

unit apartment-hotel, 527 apartments, and a center that would include stores and

restaurants for $65,000,000 (Arabic News 09-29-00). Recently, King Mohammed VI

launched a large beachside complex costing $95,000,000 including a 555 room five-star

hotel, 300 suites and apartments, 600 time-shares, a commercial center, student

housing, a yacht club and new marina, and a University Sports complex, all covering

19.7-acres (Arabic News 2001).

Geologically, the city of Agadir sits at the western edge of the Atlas Mountain fold

and thrust belt which runs from Tunisia to Agadir (Bowen 1987) where the arcing

mountain range complex (Anti-Atlas, High Atlas, Middle Atlas and Rif Mountains) create

a corridor of sympathetic active faults. The devastating earthquake of 1960 was

attributed to displacement along the Kasbah fault – Agadir’s most northern fault that

trends beneath the city running parallel to Agadir’s other two faults, the Tildi and

Lahouar (Meghraoui et al 1998). The Kasbah fault dips southeastward north of the

Kasbah and runs southwest towards the Atlantic Ocean. The Tildi fault begins at

Adrarn ’Oulma and runs southwest beneath the city through the Administrative Section

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and the New City, while the Lahouar fault follows the Lahouar River channel throughout

the southern portion of the city (AISI 1962, Ocal 1964).

The 1960 Earthquake

On February 29, 1960 at 11:40pm, during the third night of the holy month of

Ramadan, a devastating earthquake rocked the city. The Bureau Central International

de Seismologie of Strasbourg (B.C.I.S) estimated the geographical locations of the

epicenter at 30º 27’ N, 9º37 W, approximately north-northwest of the Kasbah. The

epicenter was shallow at 1.4 km beneath the surface (Cherkaoui & Medina 1988, Ocal

1964) with a Richter magnitude estimated at 5.7 to 5.9 and a Mercalli intensity of VIII to

IX (Barrett et al 1991, Meghraoui et al 1998) and its total energy release of 1020 ergs

(AISI 1962). However destructive, seismically the Agadir earthquake was considered

moderate when compared to earthquakes such as 1906 San Francisco which had a

Richter magnitude of 8.2 and total energy release of 5.0 X 1023 ergs (Keller & Pinter

2002). The city shook for 15 seconds and was nearly completely razed. An estimated

15,000 dead and an estimated 25,000 people were injured, mostly attributed to poor

architectural design and construction practices with an estimated 70% of new buildings,

and 20% of industrial buildings destroyed. (AISI 1962, Levison 1963).

The poorly constructed stone and brick structures found in the Founti, Kasbah,

and Yachech districts were largely responsible for the large number of the deaths and

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injuries in an area only ten square miles. It was reported that once the shaking began,

residents ran into their homes for protection; the dead were found predominantly in

collapsed structures rather than outside amongst the street rubble or along the beach

areas (AISI 1962, Barrett et. al. 1991, Yeats et. al.1997). Several aftershocks followed

with the strongest at 4.4 Richter causing increased dangers as relief and recovery

efforts continued (Cherkaoui & Medina 1988). Moreover, earlier in 1731 another severe

earthquake destroyed Agadir completely (Waltham 1978).

After the earthquake, most districts of the city were simply bulldozed. The

districts near to the epicenter were 100 percent destroyed; the Talborjt district was so

ruined that is was turned into a memorial garden, nicely maintained to this day. Other

destroyed areas of the city were turned into green spaces for public use (Barrett et. al.

1991).

The most common construction type in Agadir at the time of the quake was stone

and brick mortared masonry. Throughout the city, the typical mortar consisted of mud

and sand with little lime (minimal strength and integrity), while reinforced masonry like

that used in today’s modern construction, it was utilized infrequently. Roofs were

covered with timber rafters and covered with corrugated sheet iron. The typical building

described during post-earthquake assessment was three to four stories, with non-

reinforced masonry walls, partitions with plaster finishing, supporting concrete slab

floors, and roofs (AISI 1962). In addition to the masonry buildings, reinforced concrete

buildings with concrete columns with beams carrying vertical loads survived the disaster

with greater frequency than the stone/brick buildings (AISI 1962, Barrett et al 1991).

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Morocco’s Crown Prince Hassan made it a national priority to rebuild the city of

Agadir soon after the quake as a ‘modern Islamic City’. Planning and reconstruction

began quickly and within six months the majority of the rebuilding was well underway.

Zoning codes were improved and implemented as industrial, commercial, residential,

green space, and tourist areas and the ‘modern city’ incorporated pedestrian paths and

gardens that linked the newly planned neighborhoods. By 1966, three quarters of

Agadir had been rebuilt and handed over to the municipality (Barrett et. al. 1991).

Interestingly, urban plans used at the time to revitalize the razed and depressed city

also acted as a tremendous population magnet that attracted rural residents, in addition

to the displaced city-dwellers who swelled urban populations far beyond those originally

planned.

The government built three new suburbs to keep up with Agadir’s rapid growth

and from the new shanty towns popping up throughout the region: Tama ou Enza,

Agadir Sud Est (south east), and Tassila. In addition to these three new towns, the area

south east of Agadir including Ait Melloul and Inezgane, were integrated into the overall

plan in the hopes that they would act as new industrial and residential markets for the

surrounding areas. These new fringe towns would house an additional 250,000 people

attracting them from the make-shift shanty settlements throughout town and the region

(Barrett et al 1991).

Overall, Agadir’s aggressive building and resettlement programs that followed the

1960 earthquake may prove to be the perfect pair in exacerbating deaths, injury and

damages from a future quake of moderate to severe magnitude. Increased population

density in settlements atop the active faulting, built on unconsolidated sediments

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(ancient beach terraces and alluvial fans), in structures of questionable architectural

integrity may prove to be ideal prescription to cause countless deaths and injuries

throughout the City and Sousse region. Will this prove to be a recipe for disaster again?

PERCEPTION, RISK and CULTURE

How people respond to a natural disaster occurring or in preparation for another

is often a function of their culturally-derived perception from previous training,

education, and experiences. The concept of perception as the process of organizing

and using information received through sensory observation has been discussed in

works as early as The Republic (Plato 511 BCE). Plato claimed that the mind was

divided into the four realms of metaphysics, opinion, knowledge and the sensation and

that ‘perception’ existed within the realm of opinion between the worlds of knowledge

and sense. This notion that what we perceive emerges from a complex yet filtered path

of sensing, understanding, emplacing and utilizing was established 2,500 years ago, is

still accepted. Discussions of the ‘mind’s eye’ and the sieving that occurs between

observing and understanding have been active through the years, however it wasn’t

until the work of analysts like Freud, Jung and the Gestalt analysts that they began to

construct our contemporary theories on perceptions of danger, risk and safety.

In the 1920s, Sigmund Freud (1929) created a ‘mental topography’ in which he

described the complicated interaction of the psyche and reality as part of the mind’s

‘perception-consciousness system’ and believed that the senses ’take in’ impressions,

organizing them according to their relationships to impulse and instinct. He emphasized

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that what we see is only the beginning, only to be subsequently reshuffled, classified

and stored in realms that are immediately conscious and easily retrieved or buried in

areas coined the ‘preconscious’ where later recollection or dreams may divulge this

covert storage. Like Freud’s emphasis on sexual motivation and response, he also

argued that the role of faith and religious indoctrination can manipulate our psyche.

A later contemporary and colleague of Freud, Carl Jung believed in the tangible

difference between the reality of the material world and that of the psyche, and

explained that our minds operated from two primary yet seamless parts of our

consciousness. ‘Perception’ was how we acquire information about the material world

and ‘judgment’ was how we arrive at conclusions about our perceptions (Jung 1944).

By addressing the difference between perception and judgment, Jung added a new

dimension or step to the perception process suggesting that all humans first observe

through the senses, then classify, emplace and judge based on knowledge, experience

and context (Jung 1959) – highlighting the inordinate dominance that experience has on

perception.

It is still believed that it is through three ‘modifiers’ that our impressions of the

material world are molded and stored (for later recollection and use). Essentially,

Jungian perception models addressed the significance of what we have learned, what

we have experienced and/or the context in which our observations were made and how

they influence and direct our assessment of the world around us – an important concept

in understanding how our culture can sway our observations and a significant part of

understanding risk perception in Agadir. Jungian theory underscored the influence of

experience above knowledge and context in shaping our perception, however, in Agadir

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it was found that those opinions and perceptions of seismic risk were less influenced by

experience than in Islamic training, ritual and culture.

Later in 1932, Bartlett explained that humans actively sought to explain their

environment and its dangers not as ‘passive recorders’ but as involved in a ‘continual

effort after meaning’ (in Lee 1981). Bartlett suggested that the human mind worked to

make sense out of perceived chaos and potential danger often using familiarity and

knowledge to assist in lessening the perceived risk of an imminent problem or danger.

This familiarity with frequent events has been found to dramatically decrease the

risk associated with some events, while some cultural aspects have been found to

increase or decrease the relative perception of risk. White (1952) determined that

floodplain residents with the greatest experience with previous flooding underestimated

the perceived risk to future flooding. While Kates (1962), in similar findings called

floodplain occupants “prisoners of the experience who couldn’t see the future as

anything but the past.” How individuals perceive and react to imminent danger was

believed to be a function of their ‘locus of control’ – whether the hazard was due to their

own behavior or perceived shortcomings, or due to external forces beyond their control

was described by Rotter (1966). Elaborating on prior concepts of control, Seligman &

Maier (1967) discussed a second agent of vulnerability, calling it ‘learned helplessness’

or the general impotence and despair that can often quash effective coping at both

individual or community levels.

Attributing natural disasters to external forces beyond any sort of possible human

control or mitigation greatly affects how communities can manage, modifying the much-

needed involvement in the mitigation process or participation in decision-making. Lee

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(1981) claimed that these communities accepting some level of blame for the effects of

a natural hazard (i.e. faulty architecture, inadequate policies) were more likely to be

active in community decision-making and mitigation, often decreasing future risk. This

recognition that the individual’s or community’s impact can modify risk may be the key

to effective event preparation and/or mitigation (Slovic et al. 1977, Rosa 2003). These

‘orienting dispositions’ can exacerbate the denial of any blame or involvement amongst

the various social units, which may be the case with the Agadir survey participants.

In fundamentally religious communities, the role of culture may be essential in

steering community or individual responses, when views of preordination control their

scrutiny of hazard and risk (Dake 1991). But unlike this Agadir research, most prior

research on risk perception and religion has relied on findings from Western and

Christian participants and communities, and not those from Muslim communities or

within communities strongly adherent to Islam.

In the seismically active regions of Morocco and the Maghreb, it has been found

that Islam often overshadows the perceptions of those who have experienced

earthquakes compared to those who have not. Under Islam, faith can weigh heavily on

the individual and group perceptions often more than their experience. In the floodplain

communities of Bangladesh, Hutton and Haque (2002) found that 97% of the flood

displacees in the study felt that their ‘futures depended on Allah’ and that 95% of the

study respondents prayed to Allah as their primary solution to common and catastrophic

hardships at hand or those imminent even they had experienced repeated flooding.

References to the fatalistic nature of Islam and a subsequent lack of accountability for

hazardous events due to the great supremacy of Allah however, are not uncommon

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(McCrae & Costa 1986). In Muslim communities or countries where the destitute

represent huge marginalized factions (like in southern Morocco), and where power at

individual or community levels is seen as openly absent, it has been widely written that

these poor factions tend to accept all phenomena (however infrequent or cataclysmic)of

as the ‘will of Allah’ and rebuff active accountability (i.e. Ittelson et al.1974).

Conversely, Hartmann & Boyce (1990) found that this overwhelming sense of a lack of

control under Islam was more a function of caste than faith as previously studied. It was

found that in relatively affluent Muslim communities, the wealthy tend to believe that

Allah ‘helps those who help themselves’, while amongst the poor ‘Allah gave us this

position’ – the latter being the most common response throughout the Agadir survey

regardless of their socio-economic echelon.

What enables people to ‘avoid, resist or recover from harm’ (Hewitt 1997) may be

the key to understanding the responses from the Agadir survey. Heider (1958) wrote

that ‘it makes a difference whether a person discovers that the stick that strikes him falls

from a rotting tree or was hurled by an enemy’, addressing the very gist of the general

Muslim perception of natural disasters in southern Morocco. In regions commonly

affected by major quakes like alpine and southern Italy, most earthquakes usher in a

change in related policy, rebuilding standards or personal safety measures (Armigiliato

&Tinti 2003), however in communities like Agadir, where Allah is believed to control the

magnitude and frequency of all earthquakes, it was found amongst the respondents that

they believed there was little reason to anticipate and prepare for more quakes when

they are faithful to the foundational tenet of Allah’s infinite omnipotence and were

unable to alter that will of God.

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A similar case of perceived tremor origins followed the great Kocaeli, Turkey

Earthquake in 2000, where the large Golcuk Mosque was left unscathed by the tremor

amidst extensive damage and rubble. The appearance of the relatively unaffected

mosques supported the notion that the site was indeed ‘sacred’ and the congregation

‘devout’; the quake was caused by Allah to injure or kill those who were unfaithful

(www.islamicweb.com). However, because the actual damage was so widespread,

Muslim websites are filled with accusations of the liberal post-Ataturk variety of Islam

(www.albalagh.net) and the recent Turkish alignment with the ‘liberal’ European Union

as the cause of the earthquake and its extensive damage (www.hizb-ut-tahrir.org,

www.intelligence.org.il).

Nonetheless, under Islam earthquakes do not represent just any other natural

disaster, but one of unique importance to its adherents – the 99th Sura of the Qur’an is

in fact, called Surat al-Zilzal or the Chapter of the Earthquake:

In the name of the merciful and compassionate God: When the earth shall quake with its quaking! And the earth shall bring forth her burdens, and man shall say, ‘What ails her!’ On that day she shall tell her tidings, because thy Lord inspires her. On the day when men shall come up in separate bands to show their works: and he who does the weight of a dust particle of good shall see it! and he who does the weight of a dust particle of evil shall see it!

The word ‘earthquake’ is directly referenced in the Qur’an in at least five chapters

(Sura) and seven verses (ayat) (7.78, 7.91, 7.155, 29.37, 56.4, 73.14, 99.1), and

referenced indirectly in six verses (19.90, 27.88, 56.6, 69.14, 78.20, 101.5) as ‘ground

or mountains shake’ or ‘the earth moves’, compared to no references to flooding or high

water, and only five references to strong winds or storms (10.22, 21.81, 33.9, 41.16,

51.41). While other natural disasters are referenced as warnings of misdeed and poor

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faith, earthquakes are specifically cited in the Qur’an as examples of the ultimate divine

retribution and as a warning of the looming judgment day. So unlike other catastrophes

mentioned in the Qur‘an like strong winds or high water, earthquakes are reserved as

reminders of Allah’s supremacy and imminent reprisal (Qur’an c.650). This unique

position that earthquakes hold in Islam may be why they are so stigmatized in Muslim

regions, and why post-tremor mitigation is often poorly organized or under-funded, or

disregarded for risk education programs, engineering plans or community-related

policies – a critical finding in this study.

As a case in point, although it was a massive earthquake that caused the

destructive tsunami that rushed across the Indian Ocean killing 100,000s, early

discussions that attributed the disasters to the omnipotence of Allah were relatively rare.

It may have been that such massive bores and coastline flooding are less apparent as

seismogenic in nature, while ground-shaking and earth-moving events are obvious and

more easily attributable to the Qur’an. Later however, the tone of these discussions

changed and though the extensive injuries, deaths and damages crossed Christian,

Buddhist, Hindu and Muslim communities, the stigma of earthquake and Allah became

apparent. Now, current post-tsunami online chat-rooms and webpages herald the many

Indonesian mosques that remained intact and standing after the tsunami and underline

the conviction of Allah’s omnipotence and ‘hand’ in all natural disasters. So far, the

online community has not attributed the survival of these mosques to local architectural

styles, whose open and canopied designs allowed the surging waters to pass through

without battering their walls or removing the supporting pilasters. It may have been that

the media coverage that followed from newspapers, television and radio throughout the

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region explaining that the disastrous flooding was caused by a tremendous earthquake,

was the cause of the shift in the popular attitude; now suddenly Allah’s omnipotence

was an issue however previous unmentioned.

So now, while the governments of the Indian Ocean basin have begun to talk

about tsunami early-warning systems that might save thousands of lives in future

disasters, many people are still trying to sort out why they were struck by what appears

to be the hand of divine retribution. With time, it seems evident that such an insight into

culpability and fatalism is imperative in our understanding as to why some cultures must

repeatedly experience the grief, injury and death from natural disaster.

METHODOLOGY & ANALYSIS

During the spring semester of 2002, a survey instrument was designed for Arab

and Muslim respondents and administered to more than fifty Moroccan, Levantine and

North African students over two months at the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville

Campus. The campus was used since the Arab and Muslim student population was

large and it represented a good cross section of Arab and Muslim residents. This pilot

study helped identify potential problems in each questionnaire regarding language,

syntax and layout, which assisted in producing a stronger and clearer survey instrument

for later use. Employing a conventional leikert-scaled response technique (Fowler

2001), the respondent was permitted to answer along a scaled line corresponding to

complete agreement or to complete disagreement. This scaled reply allows the

researcher to quantify the answer enabling effective descriptive and inferential statistical

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analyses (Haring et al. 1992). In the study, this technique proved effective and simple,

easily correlating and divulging numerous relationships. Two scaled response

questions from the study follow (remembering that the original questions were written in

Arabic and French so the translation to English caused a slight irregularity in syntax.

The survey consisted of five demographic questions (sex, age, religion,

birthplace, education level), four questions used to determine socio-economic status (do

you own a television, car or phone; do you smoke), and two questions designed to

assess general quake historical knowledge (when was the last large earthquake; if and

when will another quake occur in Agadir). Finally, five leikert-scale questions (1-10)

were designed to illicit a general view of risk perception using a range of answers (1=I

know nothing, I disagree, no, or danger does not exist, 10=I know everything, I agree,

yes, or the danger is great):

How much do you personally know about earthquakes?Do earthquakes frighten you?Since the 1960 quake, structures in Agadir are built better to sustain earthquake damage?Will your house sustain earthquake damage? Have earthquakes in Agadir posed a danger to the people and structures in the past?

Scaled responses like these used in this survey permit the objective attachment of a

numerical value to the respondent’s opinion for statistical analyses and the assessment

of perception ranges (Haring et al. 1992).

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During May and June of 2002, the modified questionnaires were administered

across the city of Agadir. Ideally, a random sampling scheme is the most accurate

method for the statistical analyses of survey data, however, such a scheme would be

time-consuming, expensive and improbable in its undertaking. The three-member

survey team (author, graduate student and female psychologist) targeted a mixture of

Agadir residents from a broad socio-economic range, interviewing University students

and faculty, Muslim clerics, shopkeepers and patrons, tourist/service industry workers,

unemployed vagrants and beggars, and government officials. If they had not been born

in Agadir, or living there for more than twenty years, the survey was discontinued and if

they had survived the 1960 earthquake those questionnaires were identified.

Since it is often difficult for a man to interview an unrelated woman in a

conservative Muslim community, a female surveyor was hired to facilitate the interviews

amongst women. A working psychologist, Zahara Essarti of Inezgane (one of the

suburbs created after the quake) proved to be an excellent choice for the surveying of

men and women alike. In fact, her mother and father’s families were both relocated to

Inezgane following the great earthquake. Moreover, her professional manner and kind

demeanor assuaged any cultural and gender difficulties amongst the interviewing team

and the respondents.

More than 243 surveys were completed (n=265) over the following five weeks

taking anywhere from five to seventy-five minutes per survey. Overall the Agadiri were

friendly and more than willing to discuss the tragedy that razed their city forty years

before. Additional notes, personal quotes and anecdotes were written on each

anonymous survey. In fact, once it was ‘out’ that two Americans were interviewing

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residents that remembered the quake, we were visited by individuals that were proud to

recount their experiences.

Data were then collected from all surveys and organized in spreadsheet formats

(MS Excel) and analyzed using SPSS statistical software.

RESULTS & DISCUSSION

Some of the results from the 243 successful interviews and surveys were

predictable and some were very revealing.

SEX: Male: 59% Female: 41%

AGE: <20yrs: 10% 20-29yrs: 45% 30-39yrs: 26% 40-49yrs: 10% 50-70yrs: 7%

BIRTHPLACE: city: 54% Village: 44% country: 2%

EDUCATION: none: 18% Primary: 25% secondary: 26% baccalaur:14% 4yr college:17%

SMOKE? yes: 27% no: 73%

TELEPHONE? yes: 67% no: 33%

TELEVISION? yes: 73% no: 27%

CAR? yes: 12% no: 88%

LAST QUAKE? <10yrs: 18% 20-30yrs: 13% 40-60yrs: 34% >100yrs: 1% exact date: 34%

ANOTHER QUAKE SOON? Yes: 6% never: 12% yes & year: 27% Allah knows best (Allahu a'lam) 53%

NEXT QUAKE? <10yrs: 20% 10-20yrs: 51% 20-40yrs: 15% 50-250yrs: 14%

KNOW ABOUT QUAKES? nothing 55% little: 15% somewhat: 10% yes some: 5% yes a lot: 15%

QUAKES FRIGHTEN YOU? no: 32% a little: 16% somewhat: 6% alot: 8% yes a lot: 38%

AGADIR STRUCTURES SAFE? yes very: 21% yes a bit: 16% somewhat: 7% not much: 20% not at all: 35%

YOUR HOUSE SAFE? yes very: 24% yes a bit: 15% somewhat: 2% not much: 20% not at all: 39%

AGADIR QUAKES DANGEROUS? no: 8% a little: 5% somewhat: 6% yes some: 8% yes a lot: 73%

The most notable results in this preliminary survey were found in the differing

perceptions between education, technology, gender, and age, in addition to the general

lack of belief in the use of seismic forecasting (from swarms) or in structural

reinforcement. This was not divulged in the simple responses but in the correlations

between demographics and scaled responses. Especially interesting and statistically

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significant were the relationships found between education levels attained, age,

television ownerships, and sex and many of the scaled response questions.

Most of the respondents were aware of the catastrophic 1960 earthquake,

however, many were unable to list the year (or neighboring years) of the disaster. Of

those who knew the exact year (and often the date), 80% were male and 20% were

female, 82% owned TVs (18% did not), 91% did not own a car (9% owned a car), and

60% only had attained a high school education, while those who had graduated from

college, a paltry 21% knew the exact year. Interestingly, most of the men surveyed

regularly watched TV while at home and/or in a cafe, while women in general watched

television less. This confirmed an early observation in Agadir that television watching

provided the greatest source of accurate information regarding the great quake. It may

be that regional lifestyles offered more leisure time for men to watch TV and to learn

about the event, while women had less leisure time due to child-rearing and house-

keeping chores conventional in North African Muslim societies, and therefore watched

television less and were less apt to know facts of the event.

In general, nonetheless, gender played a minor role in the correlations. For

example, 56% of the women and 51% of the men interviewed stated that only Allah was

in control of earth tremors and that scientific analysis to any degree was ‘haram’ or

prohibited in the Qur‘an and/or Hadith. The high number of respondents that declared

that science often interfered with Islam was possibly the most surprising finding in this

study. When participants were asked if they had any idea if the region was seismically

active and/or if more quakes were possible within their lifetimes or ever again, more

than half of all respondents answered “Allahu a‘lam” or ‘God knows best’, most refusing

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to make a simple guess or a ‘yes’ or ‘no’ stating that this sort of prediction may only

come from the realm of the divine.

As observed in Agadir, the answer of ‘Allahu a‘lam’ was found to correlate to

education only. Of the respondents stating that ‘Allah knows best’, 25% had never

attended school, 28% had only attended primary school, 29% secondary school only,

9% attended some college, and 9% had graduated from a four-year university. This

relationship suggests that a fundamental adherence to the Qur’an is more common

amongst the poorly educated than those having attended more schooling. Although it

was found that this presumption was prevalent in North African Sunni communities, no

such direct reference may be found in the Qur‘an. In fact, Quranic references are

common that may be interpreted otherwise, suggesting that Allah blesses those who

use the intelligence that he gave them:

“He grants wisdom to whom He pleases; and he to whom wisdom is granted receives a benefit overflowing; but none will grasp the Message but men of this understanding” (2:269).

However as long as there are Quranic and Hadithic references to thought and

discovery, there are always those addressing misfortune and disaster as retribution:

“How will it be when a disaster hits them, as a consequence of their own works? They will come to you then and swear by God that "Our intentions were good and righteous!" (4:62);

“those who transgressed were annihilated by disaster, leaving them in their homes dead” (11:67);

“Have you noted those who responded to God's blessings by disbelieving, and thus brought disaster upon their own families?” (14:28);

Education also played

a large role as to how the

participants viewed the

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nature of forecasting and prediction. Although only one quarter of the survey

participants said that another earthquake was imminent ever, of those the stated ‘yes’,

over half had attained a college undergraduate or graduate degree. This finding

corroborates many of the preliminary anecdotal observations, however they are clearer

than first suggested indicating the power of a formal education in supporting ‘predictive’

seismic assessment for agencies like Morocco’s Emergency Management, or

Seismological Services in Rabat – an important inference for effective country-wide

seismic forecasting, warning and possible evacuation policies or plans.

CONCLUSION and IMPLICATIONS

Western culture with its ‘rational, empirical and quantitative’ scientific inquiry is

often weak at understanding the relationships between faith, human vulnerability,

hazards and community perspectives, often ignoring divergent or differing indigenous

psychologies and perspectives of the world or cosmos (Fabrega 1983). Islam, like most

religions affects ethics and patterns of behavior, cultural adaptation, and can facilitate a

distinctive organization of reality through individual, community and/or regional

perception.

In survey research conducted in Agadir, Morocco to assess individual and group

perceptions of seismic risk following a catastrophic earthquake forty years before, most

survey participants found questions about earthquake knowledge to be somewhat funny

or ridiculous, while questions about their sense of a possible earthquake recurrence to

be appalling. Such is the case that we found throughout most of this sleepy beach

resort city. The most commonly shared perception was the laissez-faire or fatalistic

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attitude that “Allahu a‘lam“ or ‘God only best’, such that any question or implication

interpreting the will of God, or questioning its omnipotence was ‘haram’ (strictly

prohibited). This common reply was shared equally by men and women, uneducated

and educated, poor and rich, and civilian and military; exposing the personal and social

notion that science and its predictive capabilities (however developmental) somehow

violated or contradicted Allah as prescribed in Qur‘an and Hadithic texts.

By western perspectives, this widespread naïveté, malaise or fatalism regarding

the community’s invulnerability to future tremors was an essential finding in assessing

the perception of risk within this Muslim community or from the individual. Moreover,

these crucial findings suggest that no matter what recommendations are made at

community, regional or national levels, the Agadir conclusions indicate that Muslim

communities may ignore conventional ‘Western’ indicators of imminent severe

earthquakes such as tremor swarms (Keller & Pinter 2002), disregard recommendations

for stabilizing weak structures in seismic high-risk zones (Mills et al 2001), and/or

neglect effective (and conventional) community education and risk prevention programs.

Studies of this kind are rare and nearly unknown in the West and in English. Previous

research into environmental perception in Muslim communities have dealt primarily with

flood victims in Bangladesh (Hutton & Haque 2003), substandard construction

techniques (Havelick 1986, ICRC 2001, Opricovic et al 2002 ), or those related to the

casualties of religious persecution and/or fundamentalism (Gerner & Schwedler 2004) –

emphasizing the importance of this proposed research and in the need to compare the

potential findings of Muslim communities to those in nearby Christian communities that

are also at risk of significant earthquakes. A summary of the survey results follow:

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►The less educated respondents (the social majority throughout Morocco and North Africa) were more likely to deny the significance of scientific assessment and forecasting adding that “Allah knows best’ and that level of protection was above all more important and effective;

►The more educated respondents answered that more quakes were imminent (in this seismically active region), while the less educated stated that Allah protected those who were devout and were generally adverse to scientific assessment, forecasting, or new construction technologies. Such ‘predictive’ modeling like earthquake forecasting was akin to fortune-telling and believed to be prohibited or ‘haram’ in the Qur’an and Hadith;

►The younger respondents were more likely to believe that new structures were safe simply because they were concrete, commonly ignorant of the necessity for new or retro-fitted iron reinforcement in concrete structures when many structures built in Agadir after the great Quake and/or commonly built today display no, limited or misplaced iron reinforcement and/or inferior mortar materials;

► Women were more likely to fear earthquakes and their damage more ardently than men, while men were less afraid and generally considered themselves more knowledgeable of seismic cause, activity, and its effects;

► Respondents who owned televisions believed that they were generally less knowledgeable and more at risk from injury or death from earthquakes (rather than non-television owners), indicating that media can expose personal and community ignorance as well as educate them;

► Respondents who owned televisions were also truly more knowledgeable about the exact date and general statistics of the 1960 earthquake, although they still considered themselves much less knowledgeable: supporting the value of televisions as a simple, yet effective education tool in the area.

In seismically active regions like the Maghreb, a discussion and understanding of

Islam-influenced naïveté and fatalistic attitudes about earthquakes is more than an

interesting academic exercise, it can affect the very core of effective urban planning,

economic progress, building standards and practices, and the quality of life. As Agadir

plans for more development despite the potential for more quakes, knowledge of

seismological assessment, related mitigation and risk is vital. Impressive and grand

resort, tourist and residential construction projects are planned for Agadir in the next few

years. These new beachside complexes include a $65,000,000 recreation complex with

a marina and a 250-room luxurious hotel, 700 apartments and a shopping and

restaurant mall, and a $95,000,000 project that includes a yacht harbor and marina, a

500-room five-star hotel with 600 time-share apartments, 300 suites and apartments

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and a commercial center all covering 20 acres – located within one mile of the Kasbah

Fault that ruptured in the 1960 tremors (Arabic News 2001).

In Evil in Modern Thought, Susan Neiman (2002) noted that the 1755 Lisbon

earthquake and tsunami, which destroyed the city and several thousands of its

residents,

"shook the Enlightenment all the way to East Prussia, where an unknown minor scholar named Immanuel Kant wrote three essays on the nature of earthquakes for the Königsberg newspaper."

Voltaire and Rousseau bickered over the significance of the tragedy, and even scholars

across Europe dedicated prize essay contests to it. For many scholars like Neiman,

Rousseau's attempt, in the aftermath of the disaster, to separate moral evils from

natural disasters marks the beginning of modernity. This search for meaning in natural

disasters involves central questions about the structure of our world, and what it means

for us to think and act within it – essential considerations when linking belief to

perception, and to knowledge.

Developing nations are often at a greater risk of urban crowding and

overpopulation, and those problems associated with such growth including poor

planning, weak infrastructure and shoddy construction practices through poorly

enforced building codes (Havelick 1986). As Morocco’s population (and Agadir’s) is

estimated to double within 20-25 years, seismic activity, poor architectural integrity and

high urban population density can combine to spell catastrophe. High density

congestion can place enormous pressures on trying to provide adequate housing that is

safe and affordable, which increase the greatest risk for injuries and death due to

hurried and sub-standard construction practices (AISA 1962, Ocal 1964). The

accelerated urbanization of Agadir is only worsening problems in housing, sanitation,

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infrastructure, organization of urban and public places, and unemployment (Nelson

1985, Barrett 1991). So, when Agadir and the southern coast of Morocco encounters

another significant earthquake these areas of high population density will sustain the

greatest number of injuries, deaths, and damage since the poor construction practices

noted after the 1960 earthquake have continued with only minor upgraded standards

(Mills et al. 2001). It becomes obvious that an understanding of earthquake hazards

and their related risks is not simply an academic exercise, but may be a way to save

lives, grief and culture – Allahu a‘lam (God knows best).

“For even if a Qur‘an caused mountains to move, or the earth to tear asunder, or the dead to speak (they will not believe). God controls all things. Is it not time for the believers to give up and realize that if God willed, He could have guided all the people? The disbelievers will continue to suffer disasters, as a consequence of their own works, or have disasters strike close to them, until God's promise is fulfilled. God will never change the predetermined destiny” (13:31).

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