Professor Hee Kyung Park from the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering gave a lecture at the S&T Biz Colloquium Seminar in the BTM Department building (N22) this Wednesday.

Below is a brief summary of the lecture for those who missed the event.

Title: Innovation and Disasters Management

Lecturer: Professor Hee Kyung Park (Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Director of the KAIST Institute for Disasters Study)

All disasters are caused by people, and thus can be viewed as social disasters. Disasters are inevitable in the course of societal development, and their likelihoods increase as society becomes more complex in terms of innovation, technology and urbanization. While the ability to control disasters must be developed, it can hardly match the speed of societal development. Thus we must acknowledge that disasters are inevitable, and aim for a disaster-tolerant, not a disaster-free, society. Disasters occur when social infrastructure is damaged, and as infrastructure becomes more and more advanced the significance of disaster management has also increased. The goal of disaster management must be sustainability based on diversity, redundancy, connection, and emergence. Korea is becoming a risk society as the result of the extensive focus on catch-up innovations. We should instead pursue disaster management while transitioning into a society aiming for frontier innovations.