All of us are probably familiar with the folk tale of the three pigs; how each pig built a house in a different way, the lazy one out of straw, the not so lazy one out of wood, and the industrious one out of brick. And then along came the big, bad wolf that blew down the straw and wooden houses and left only the brick structure standing. Implied in this nursery story, however, is another message about what is considered best practice when it comes to risk management and disaster preparedness. The emphasis is all about applying the appropriate technology (a brick house) to withstand the perceived hazard (strong winds) that has come to constitute the dominant way in which disasters are conceived of and prepared for in western imaginings and policies. It is assumed that people are put ‘at risk’ from hazards because they are in the wrong spot at the wrong time; the proper response is to apply the necessary scientific expertise and technological solution to predict or prevent the threat and so reduce the risk. [...]