Dr. Virgil Storr discusses the political economy of disaster and post-disaster recovery. Specifically, he looks at data and stories from Hurricane Katrina, the largest natural disaster in U.S. history.

Additionally, Storr seeks to understand why people returned to the devastation of Katrina and how people actually went about recovering. While conducting his research to answer these questions, he came across four recurring themes:

1. The role of club goods
2. A sense of place
3. Commercial entrepreneurship
4. Social entrepreneurship

Storr concludes with his thoughts on the implications of his research on post-disaster public policy. Most importantly, he discusses how government policies generated a significant amount of uncertainty, slowing the pace of the recovery.