Resilience: A Call For Dynamism and Equity
In considering the resilience of a given system or community, resilience is often regarded as a static outcome or as a dynamic process.
The former approach measures the system’s ability to revert or “bounce back” to the same state or condition it was in prior to a disturbance or disaster (Cutter, 2016). On a corollary, in the outcome vulnerability tradition within in vulnerability studies, vulnerability is seen as “the end-point of a sequence of analyses” defined by “any residual consequences that remain after adaptation” (O’Brien et al, 2007). At the core of these mode of thinking are the assumptions, first, that it suffices to analyse a system using a “single static snapshot” of its response (or vulnerability) to a particular shock (Cutter 2016), and more fundamentally, that a system exists in a state which continues otherwise unchanged save for disturbance or disaster. From the ‘static outcome’ viewpoint, resilience is measured using assets such as infrastructure and livelihood (Cutter, 2016).
When the resilience of a system is perceived as a dynamic process, which morphs and evolves with the input and output of feedback, adaptive learning, and change, the focus shifts towards enhancing its capacity from a social, governance, and economic level (Cutter, 2016). Inherent resilience is then utilised not only as “the benchmark for ‘bouncing back’”, but also “the starting point for potential measurements of change in resilience” (Cutter, 2016). Similarly, within the tradition of context vulnerability, vulnerability is viewed as under constant influence by various ever-changing contextual conditions comprising “dynamic social, economic, political, institutional and technological structures and processes” (O’Brien et al, 2007). Measuring resilience, then, becomes an exercise in understanding the complexity of its characteristics and capacities including “community trust, social capital, and governance” (Cutter, 2016).
The tension between the two frameworks – i.e. whether resilience ought to be understood as a static outcome or as a dynamic process, and the resultant disparity in measurements of resilience – dovetails easily into the commentary made by Pelling and Garschagen (2019) in their paper on equitable climate adaptation in which they argue, amongst others, that adaptive measures must “focus on social vulnerability, rather than broader resilience, to bring disparities to the foreground”.
According to Pelling and Garschagen, “[policymakers] must put the needs of the most vulnerable first”, “putting them at the centre of decision-making with funding”, instead of continuing to “[perpetuate old patterns that concentrate land, capital, and resources in the hands of a few” (2019).
This resonates with Cutter’s position, i.e. that the lack of clarity in the definition, conceptualisation, and assessment of resilience can often lead to abuses of power which “maintain the status quo and the existing power structure of elites”, thus preserving “the disenfranchisement of selected group sand/or communities” by reason of pre-existing “inequalities in patterns, processes, and perspectives” (2016).
Different discourses, which spring from varied systems of representation or areas of language use, expressing certain standpoints of their host institutions (O’Brien et al, 2007), delineate how an issue or problem is framed, which in turn “influence the questions that are asked and structure the kind of knowledge that is produced. They determine what is included on the agenda, and what is silenced” (O’Brien et al, 2007).
The challenge for the scientific community is to open its eyes and ears to the subaltern, who are the most affected by climate events, by speaking to the poorest members of our communities and understanding their concerns and preferences, by ensuring that “local livelihoods and building designs” reflect local agendas and customs, and by measuring policy progress by the extent to which they “capture the needs and realities of the most vulnerable” (Pelling and Garschagen, 2019).
References:
Cutter, S.L. (2016). ‘Resilience To What? Resilience For Whom?’. The Geographical Journal, 182(2) 2016, 110–113.
Pelling, M., and Garschagen, M. (2019). ‘Put Equity First in Climate Adaptation’. Nature 569(7756) 2019, pp.327–329.
O’Brien, K., Eriksen, S., Nygaard, L.P., and Schjolden, A.N.E. (2007) ‘Why Different Interpretations of Vulnerability Matter in Climate Change Discourses’. Climate Policy 7(1) 2007, pp.73–88