Former U.S. Attorney General Edwin Meese III moderated a panel discussion in the Dome Room of the Rotunda Sunday, in which scholars discussed the response to emergency situations.
The talk, titled "Our Culture Confirmed or Confounded: Critical Incidents in the Public Eye," was sponsored by the University-based Critical Incident Analysis Group.
Meese opened the talk by stressing the need for collaboration between the public and government entities to maintain and improve stability and transparency during crises.
Steve Tidwell, executive director of the FBI National Academy, discussed the formation of the FBI's Hostage Rescue Team and its preparation and management for the 1984 Summer Olympics.
He expressed the public's expectation for constant participation from the government in responding to emergencies. "The most significant [example] of that and the greatest challenge the country has seen in some time was Katrina because it redefined how we responded and participated as a group," Tidwell said.
Tidwell added the period after 9/11 helped correct the problems associated with how federal, state and local governments interact.
Shaun Casey, Assoc. Prof. of Christian ethics and director of the National Capital Semester for Seminarians at Wesley Theological Seminary, explained the relationship between the academic study of religion and the analysis of critical incidents.
Casey said religiously motivated actors often initiate national catastrophes but added that creating an open dialogue between religious groups and government agencies would facilitate the better handling of future critical incidents.
Simeon Yates, director of the Cultural, Communication and Computing Research Institute at Sheffield Hallam University in the United Kingdom, focused on the ways new media and technologies have impacted policing.
"[The Cultural, Communication and Computing Research Institute is] noticing the way in which social media translates a major incident vary rapidly into a critical incident," Yates said.
Yates discussed plans to better understand the effects of social media on the public perception of critical incidents. "We're working with our colleagues here at Virginia and some other colleagues in Europe on projects to try and look at these issues across multiple agencies and across multiple states' vendors...," he said.
Jerry DeFrancisco, president for humanitarian services at the American Red Cross, said volunteer organizations can help augment the federal government's response to emergencies.
"[The American Red Cross is] a federally chartered organization... we respond to disasters, and we are a part of the emergency response framework," DeFrancisco said. "We have built a cadre of volunteers over the years who came to disasters."
Brad Kieserman, chief counsel for the Federal Emergency Management Agency, said government entities such as the U.S. Coast Guard and FEMA have a responsibility to lessen the harmful impacts of critical incidents.
"The notion is that there are pre-crisis, crisis, and post-crisis, [and] we have opportunities at every point to intervene, to reduce the harm, to reduce the risk, and preserve our reputations going forward," Kieserman said.
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