Five Years Beyond Sendai—Can We Get Beyond Frameworks?

The Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015–2030 (SFDRR) and its implementation is evaluated after its first five years. A dozen questions that the author and a colleague used in their evaluation of the Hyogo Framework for Action 2005–2015 (HFA) are repeated. Improvements are noted in relation to possible coherence and alignment with other components of the Post-2015 Agenda, especially as regards climate change and urban disasters as well as the higher visibility of civil society and women, and also regarding the specificity of targets and monitoring of governments’ successes. Nevertheless, the overall conclusion is that both the HFA and the SFDRR fail to deal with root causes of disaster. A new, radically proactive leadership role is suggested for the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction in partnership with civil society in identifying and warning all engaged in Post-2015 Agenda activities of possible creation of new risk by agenda implementation activities, especially for the poor and already-marginalized.