Mike Davis in his Ecology of Fear: Los Angeles and the Imagination of Disaster delivers a powerful main thesis: Los Angeles has, stupidly and defiantly, placed itself in the crosshairs of disasters--natural and manmade; its political institutions have cavalierly dared the poor to protest their treatment, and its builders, developers and growth junkies have built a city that sits squarely across fault lines, killer bee invasion routes, mountain lion ranges, and tornado corridors, to name a few.This is no place for humankind to make itself at home.

Southern California paved its orchards and built along its dangerously dry hillsides. Rapid market-driven urbanization has transgressed environmental common sense. The suburban expansion placed housing in the way of fire and that the political determination to protect rich people from inevitable blazes undermined the need to protect poor people from preventable building fires.