Gonzalo Lizarralde, Lee Bosher, Christopher Bryant, Ksenia Chmutina, Georgia Cardosi, Andrew Dainty and Danielle LabbƩ
Introduction: governance frameworks for disaster risk reduction
The resilience concept has had a major influence on Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) practices both in developing and developed countries. However, while scholars and practitioners recognise the importance of constructing and enhancing resilience, they agree neither on the scale of action at which resilience needs to be enhanced (such as communities, cities, regions or nations) nor on the priorities of different issues (such as prevention, adaptation, recovery or major transformation). Not surprisingly, the adoption of the resilience framework in different contexts has given rise to a range of very different governance approaches.
This chapter explores empirical data obtained from several case studies to identify five governance approaches that emerge within a resilience framework:
- Bottom-up, Semi-Formal Approaches emerge when community and civil society groups create their own structures and mechanisms of governance on the margins of formal institutional systems, an approach illustrated by urban markets in Nairobi (Kenya);
- Institutional Delegation which emphasises a top-down transfer of responsibilities, an approach adopted by UK policy in order to deal with natural hazards;
- Protective Institutions which emphasise the Stateās role in protecting citizens and facilities, an approach adopted in the UK in dealing with terrorism and international threats;
- Transformative Process which underlines the importance of radical changes in institutions and society (notably in the aftermath of disasters), an approach that was widely popular after the 2010 earthquake in Haiti;
- Institutional Networking which emphasises the interrelationships that are required in order to deal with environmental threats, an approach largely adopted in Cuba, a communist state internationally renowned for its sophisticated DRR approach.
In this chapter, the heterogeneous character of the resilience framework, as well as significant differences in stakeholder participation in, and responsibility for, decision-making are emphasised. The wide range of different contexts in which the resilience framework has been adopted leads to a variety of governance processes. The discussion ultimately invites readers to question the ethical value of specific forms of governance and points to the tensions and contradictions that emerge in the operationalisation of a resilience framework.
In the chapter, we first discuss the multiple faces of resilience. Despite the differences that exist, a number of patterns are identified. Then, based on a number of case studies, five different resilience approaches are recognised. Finally, we discuss the different forms of governance in the integration of a resilience framework and attempt to make sense of them, before presenting our conclusions drawing upon an ethical approach to resilience and governance.
The multiple faces of resilience
For many years, scholars, policy-makers and organisations alike have been enthusiastically seduced by the resilience concept (Alexander, 2013). This is not completely surprising, given that the concept has been seen as being capable of bridging the conceptual and practical gaps between DRR and disaster response and reconstruction (Bosher, 2008; Bosher and Chmutina, 2017). It has also stimulated inspiring ideas about peopleās capacity to bounce back and thrive despite the odds and the hostility of the environment (Davoudi et al., 2012). Along with sustainability, resilience has become a popular maxim in both academic and economic circles (Cutter et al., 2008). More recent analyses and empirical studies, however, have revealed some of the drawbacks and limitations of the resilience approach (MacKinnon and Derickson, 2013; Pizzo, 2015; White and OāHare, 2014). Opponents of resilience have raised serious doubts about its usefulness and relevance (Stumpp, 2013). They argue that the concept is overused and creates only broad or contradictory meanings and interpretations (Alexander, 2013). More problematic still, some scholars have argued that the concept has been hijacked by neoliberal policy- and decision-makers to legitimise the shift of responsibilities from the State towards markets and the most vulnerable communities (Evans and Reid, 2014; Joseph, 2013). In sum, for them resilience is mainly a fashionable buzzword lacking sufficient moral value (Brand and Jax, 2007; Lizarralde, 2016).
As we shall see in this chapter, both overexcitement about the resilience notion as well as total scepticism towards it might be distorted interpretations of the concept. In reality, when adopted by policy- and decision-makers, resilience is shaped, and shapes, different forms of governance that embrace diverse sets of values, and thus might embody dissimilar moral worth to stakeholders.
In fact, even the most fervent proponents of resilience disagree on the scale, objectives and means to achieve it (Carpenter et al., 2001; Cutter et al., 2008). For some, it must be achieved at the community level (Cutter et al., 2008). Social scientists have claimed that this is the scale at which social groups can best develop the adaptive capacities necessary to survive in hostile rural and urban environments (Norris et al., 2008). These authors highlight the importance of bottom-up approaches that can compensate for the general weaknesses of traditional top-down policies and the injustices that they frequently generate. They see in community resilience the opportunity to redress historic power abuses by political and economic elites (MacKinnon and Derickson, 2013). These same authors however typically fail to explain how individual interventions within urban communities can be articulated into comprehensive strategic plans and thus how to avoid urban fragmentation.
Other defenders and promoters of resilience, such as the Rockefeller Foundation (leading the ā100 Resilient Citiesā programme) and the UNISDR (leading the āMaking Cities Resilientā programme) recognise that, in a largely urbanised world, cities have become complex ecosystems in which individual settlements, communities and neighbourhoods are interconnected and interdependent. These organisations promote urban resilience as a means to deal with the various issues currently faced by cities: transportation, crime, waste management, water, sanitation, infrastructure, etc. (Birkmann, 2006; Pickett, Cadenasso and Grove, 2004; Prasad et al., 2009; UNISDR, 2012; Vale and Campanella, 2005). They encourage systemic responses that articulate stakeholders and citizens at the first and most immediate scale of representative government: municipalities.
Some observers note, however, that terrorism, climate change and variability, pollution and natural hazards often transcend the boundaries of cities, and even countries. Thus they highlight the importance that regions and nations play in dealing with the new factors of vulnerability at the global scale. They point to common examples: urban food security can only be achieved through social contracts between rural and agricultural areas (Caldwell, 2015); refugees and forcibly displaced populations transcend nationsā boundaries and even oceans, and thus violence and terrorism require transnational partnerships and collaboration (Agier and Lecadet, 2014); climate change is a global problem that needs to be dealt with in rapidly growing countries such as China and India, as much as in highly industrialised countries such as Canada and the United States (Bryant et al., 2013; Moser and Satterthwaite, 2010; UN-Habitat, 2011).
Contradictions also arise regarding the emphases that can/should be given to the resilience agenda ā particularly in times of tight budgets. Some stakeholders look for vulnerability reduction over anything else. Others expect efficient planning and preparation, and still others seek for a rapid response in the event of calamities. Additional confusion also stems from diverging objectives typically associated with a resilience framework. Some scholars and organisations consider that resilience is a means for DRR and social justice (Prasad et al., 2009). Others, pointing to the potentially transformative qualities of resilience (peopleās empowerment and environmental protection, for instance), see resilience as an objective in itself (Cutter et al., 2008). Given all these different interpretations and viewpoints, what types of governance structures and mechanisms emerge when the resilience framework is adopted?
Identifying patterns
In this chapter, we argue that, despite the significant differences presented above, some conceptual patterns emerge in theory and practice. The argument is based
Table 1.1 Information about the study that supports this chapter
on recent research projects conducted by the Canadian Disaster Resilience and Sustainable Reconstruction Research Alliance (Åuvre Durable for its French acronym), a multidisciplinary team of experts in DRR and response. The seven-year overall investigation involved conducting a series of longitudinal case studies (Eisenhardt, 1989; Proverbs and Gameson, 2008; Yin, 2003) in different countries and contexts and drawing meta-patterns from them. The investigation includes an iterative process of identifying conceptual patterns and comparing them with practical results obtained from the case studies, until analytical generalisations are reached. In this chapter, we assert that five governance approaches emerge when the resilience framework is adopted. We summarise here empirical data from five cases that serve to illustrate these approaches (Table 1.1). In all cases, data were collected over a period of at least two years, from primary sources such as interviews, detailed observations, project visits, among other primary sources. We also analysed secondary sources such as policy documents, contractual documents, press clips and project reports.
We rely on the four levels of triangulation identified by Love, Holt and Li (2002): (a) data triangulation, or the comparison of sources of information; (b) interdisciplinary triangulation, where we compare perspectives coming from Architecture, Construction Management, Geography and Urban Planning; (c) methodological triangulation, where multiple methods of data collection and analysis are used; and (d) investigator triangulation, by having first different researchers (co-authors) independently analysing data on the same phenomenon and later validating the results. Additional details about the specific methods adopted in each case can be found in the references cited in Table 1.1.
Five resilience approaches
We will now explore the different approaches to governance and the examples that help to illustrate them.
1 Semi-formal approaches
Probably no other form of governance inspires more social scientists than semi-formal approaches in which civil society groups and citizens organise bottom-up structures and movements to struggle against the odds of an oppressive and hostile environment. In fact, this is the very form of resilience that has encouraged anthropologists, sociologists, architects and urban planners to adopt the resilience framework. They see in it a powerful tool to redress historic forms of segregation, marginalisation and exclusion by political and economic elites. Examples of vulnerable communities developing structures and mechanisms of survival and development abound, and have been enthusiastically reported by both academics and decision makers. In some cases, the objective is recovery, such as the case of indigenous communities in India that organised to recover after the Asian tsunami in 2004 (Barenstein, 2006) and after a tropical cyclone in 1996 (Bosher, 2010). In other cases, the process is about preventing calamities, such as the case of coastal rural communities in Canada that recently organised to prevent the effects of climate change (Bousbaine and Bryant, 2015; Caldwell, 2015). Finally, in many cases, such as the urban communities in BogotĆ” that organised in Juntas de AcciĆ³n Popular (or local committees) to plan and design public spaces (Kellett and HernĆ”ndez-GarcĆa, 2013), efforts were aimed at responding to citizensā needs and aspirations in the absence of a State capable of providing infrastructure, housing or services for all.
The case of the self-organised reconstruction process adopted by the Toi Market community in Kibera, one of largest slums in Africa, helps us see the merits of this proce...
