There’s a lot to learn in the aftermath of a natural disaster, especially about your elected officials, as anyone living in New York and New Jersey can tell you. Natural disasters separate effective policies from ineffective ones because those policies are suddenly required to work, and politicians are judged by how they respond and how well they prepared.
In Istanbul, where I live, politicians are in a race against time, and time is winning by about three years. The vast city is as vulnerable to earthquakes as Los Angeles, but not as prepared. Istanbul is very close to the North Anatolian Fault, which runs beneath the Marmara Sea, and whose most significant break is said to occur every 500 years. The last time the fault broke, the city was ruined. Landmarks collapsed; thousands died; and the city walls, famous for halting invasions, were useless against floodwaters. That quake, nicknamed “the Little Apocalypse,” hit in 1509, 503 years ago.
looking beyond borders 