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![RESILIENCE: the ability
to overcome the impacts
of large, negative events
[by a combination of
resistance and adaptation].
Not the only definition, not exclusive, not
comprehensive, and not incontestable.](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/makingsocietyresilient2025-06-03copenhagen-250515085235-94a4d67c/85/Making-Society-Resilient-Disaster-Preparedness-14-320.jpg)
![Edward S. Herman and Noam Chomsky 1988.
Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy
of the Mass Media. Pantheon Books, New York.
Central question:-
What is the value and impact of good,
‘hard’ scientific information in a
[digital] age of relativism, extremism
and a lack of clear morality?](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/makingsocietyresilient2025-06-03copenhagen-250515085235-94a4d67c/85/Making-Society-Resilient-Disaster-Preparedness-55-320.jpg)
Uploaded byProf. David E. Alexander (UCL)
Making Society Resilient: Disaster Preparedness
A survey of the state of disaster risk reduction and theoretical models of disaster in society.
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Making Society Resilient: Disaster Preparedness
- 1. Prof. David Alexander MAKINGSOCIETY RESILIENT Tōhoku University Disaster Preparedness, Planning and Resilience: Moving Towards an Active 'Whole-of-Society' Approach
- 2. Agenda:- • risk andresilience • complexity • context • foresight • conclusions
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- 5. Risk communication Warning Protective action The warning process OrganisationalSocial Technical Hazard Evaluation Administrators Scientists General Public Decision to warn
- 6. Welcome to LosAngeles 01/2025 30 deaths
- 7. The common threadsthat link the Valencia, October 2024, floods and Los Angeles, January 2025, fires are the neglect or mismanagement of the environment and failure to urbanise in an environmentally compatible manner.
- 8. We live ina volatile world in which the past is no longer a reliable guide to the future. Change can be sudden and unanticipated.
- 9. Mami Mizutori, Head ofthe UN Office for Disaster Risk Reduction: "…at the midpoint of the implementation of the 2015 agreements, progress has stalled and, in some cases, reversed. • effect of the Covid pandemic • short-termism • weakened multilateralism • rising inequality • barriers between science, perception and decision- making • war, insurgency and conflict
- 10. Systematic risk refersto the possible breakdown of an entire system rather than merely the failure of some of its parts. Existential risk refers to the likelihood of a disaster that threatens the existence of all or a significant part of the human race.
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- 12. Some possible high-impact,low-probability events • VEI7 volcanic eruption - 'volcanic winter', collapse of agriculture* • magnitude 9 earthquake and tsunami in Tokyo-to- Kobe region • major nuclear radiation emission - with or without blast • proliferating technological failure - toppling dominoes • Carrington space-weather event (or larger) *a return to the concept of Earth's ‘carrying capacity’
- 13.
- 14. RESILIENCE: the ability toovercome the impacts of large, negative events [by a combination of resistance and adaptation]. Not the only definition, not exclusive, not comprehensive, and not incontestable.
- 15. Resilience:- • is itan objective, a process or a strategy? • does it mean 'bounce-back' or 'bounce-forward’? • on what scale should it focus – that of the community?
- 16. Is resilience anillusion? It relies on the concept of homeostasis, the innate tendency of a system to seek equilibrium, whatever the shocks applied to it. In disaster risk reduction, we have no equilibrium.
- 17.
- 18. RISK Cascading risk tightly-coupled systems andcritical infrastructure Compound risk multiple extreme events Interacting risk environmental drivers Interconnected risk interdependent natural, human and technological systems Composite risk any and all? COMPLEXITY
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- 20. Cascade path Escalation Vulnerability scenarios Risk scenario Primary impact Secondary impacts Cascade path Hazard event(s) After Nones &Pescaroli 2016, Pescaroli & Nones 2016 Interaction between vulnerabilities Legislation Management Time-space transitions
- 21. Critical infrastructure isthe main vehicle by which disasters produce cascading impacts. To a greater or lesser extent, all modern disasters are cascading events. If you want to understand the risks to critical infrastructure, you need to understand all four of its dimensions: physical, technological, cyber and social.
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- 23. Wajima, Japan: Notopeninsula earthquake and floods, 2024: damage to critical infrastructure seriously inhibited the provision of aid, assistance and rescue
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- 25. We can define'context' as the social, economic, cultural, psychological and environmental milieu that surrounds disaster risk and to some degree interacts with it. If necessary, we can disaggregate different types of context. However, overall, context should be considered as the sum of elements that have no direct causal relationship with disaster but, paradoxically, are (or should be) essential to any attempt to explain it.
- 26. Threats and hazardsContext Increased magnitude and frequency of meteorological events. A changing and generally harsher climate. Proliferating technological failure. Increasing dependency on ever more sophisticated and insidious technology. Unplanned mass migration. Destruction of habitable environments; effects of conflict. Intersection of conflict (war, insurgency, persecution) and natural hazard impacts. Increasing instability and propagation of violence. A Carrington space weather event with severe damage to global navigation systems and electricity distribution. Dependency on electricity and satellites for many activities. An extremely large earthquake or volcanic eruption. The potential collapse of agriculture and reluctance to permit mass migration, or for earthquakes, the vulnerability of structures and heritage to major damage.
- 27. The "egg hypothesis"Disaster • vulnerabilities • prima facie causes • dynamic pressures • root causes Context • general vulnerability • poverty • deprivation • marginalisation • discrimination
- 28. HAZARD or THREAT SPECIFIC VULNERABILITY HUMAN CONSEQUENCES The 'hazardscape'or the 'risk landscape' WEAKENING of the SOCIAL FABRIC GENERAL VULNERABILITY HUMAN CONSEQUENCES The 'wreckage economy' Health Employment Services • reduced • rationed • overpriced
- 29. INTERSECTIONALITY SOVEREIGNTY DEMOCRACY MOBILITY IDENTITY HUMANRIGHTS LEGALITY ENTITLEMENT ANTI- CORRUPTION WELFARE COMPLEX DISASTERS
- 30. Intersectionality - borrowed(with apologies) from studies of gender, race and culture Intersection of: • forms of disaster causality • different kinds of disaster and crisis • disaster and its context • disaster and social circumstances
- 31. INTERSECTIONALITY: An exceptionally highsensitivity to political decisions, especially those with direct operational consequences.
- 32. Self-esteem Achievement, mastery,recognition Self-actualisation Talent, creativity, fulfilment Connection Physical participation, cyber-participation Belonging Identity, family, communities, workplace Threat and hazard abatement Safety, security, protection Welfare Reconsidering Abraham Maslow's pyramid of needs Food, water, sanitation, shelter, warmth, healthcare
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- 34. Cyber crime (illegal activity) deception theft Digitalterrorism (sabotage) computer viruses ransomware Digital influence (subversion) spreading false information Digital extremism (on-line intervention) conspiracy theories character assassination incitement to violence MISUSE OF THE INTERNET AND SOCIAL MEDIA
- 35. CASCADING DISASTERS The confluence ofsocial and technical factors “Digital authoritarianism”:- • influence not sabotage (i.e., subversion) • dissident groups AND state actors "Digital extremism":- • reality - perception - opinions - action • anomie (Durkheim 1893): a condition of instability resulting from a breakdown of standards and values or from a lack of purpose or ideals
- 36. LOSS OF HUMAN RIGHTS PROXYWAR, CONFLICT & POLARISATION POVERTY & MARGINALISATION 'WRECKAGE ECONOMY' & RISE OF THE PRECARIAT LACK OF DISASTER GOVERNANCE CORRUPTION & LOSS OF TRUST ANOMIE NIHILISM constraints upon life and safety Anomie (Durkheim 1893) is a condition of instability resulting from a breakdown of standards and values or from a lack of purpose or ideals.
- 37. Politics in theservice of economics DISASTER POLITICS ECONOMICS SOCIAL CONDITIONS PHYSICAL IMPACT VULNERABILITY Knowledge is ideology Underlying risk drivers Complexity Ideology • extremism • separatism • isolationism • exclusion Conflict Climate change Demographic change • human mobility Cultural conflict Technology
- 38. Are we moving inexorablyto the end of the second Age of Englightenment? …and entering a period of darkness and authoritarianism?
- 39. Where are ourstandards and moral principles? • human rights - in retreat • democracy - threatened by authoritarianism • identity - acquires new meaning • sovereignty - in a globalised world, needs to be redefined • mobility - no longer containable • welfare - undefined, undefinable? • hegemony (proxy wars) - destructive free-for-all • legality - under threat by anomie (nihilism)
- 40. Perception: cultural filter Decision-making: risk- managementpractices Benign Malignant Technology as a source of risk reduction Technology as an inadvertent source of risk Technology as a deliberate source of risk Ceaseless development of technology
- 41. FORESIGHT: present trends, futuretendencies
- 42. We need toexercise foresight:- • greater magnitude and frequency of meteorological events (climate change) • proliferating technological failure • unplanned mass migration • exceptionally large geophysical events • intersection of conflict (or other agents) and disasters • emerging hazards and threats
- 43. There are atleast 35 possible foresight methodologies, e.g.:- • Wild cards / Weak signals (WiWe) • Scenario formulation • Counterfactual analysis • Expert panels • Interviews • Literature reviews • Relevance trees / Logic charts • Scanning • Surveys • Strengths - Weaknesses - Opportunities - Threats (SWOT) • "Red teaming" (destructive criticism)
- 44. When we makea risk register we tend to look at risks (i.e., hazards, threats) singly. They don't occur alone, they occur in groups and assemblages. Hence the importance to planning of scenarios
- 45. SCENARIO DEVELOPMENT Worst case Envelope ofoutcomes Best case 'upward' counter-factual analysis 'downward' counter-factual analysis EMERGENCY PLAN incorporation of scenario into plan stress test of plan systems methodology data and basic information emergency simulation - desktop - command post - field exercise consider practicalities FORESIGHT FORESIGHT
- 46.
- 47. Caesar Augustus (63 BC–AD 14) "The more complex a problem, the simpler the solution should be."
- 48. H.L. Mencken (1880-1956) "For everycomplex problem, there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong."
- 49. H.L. Mencken (1880-1956) "A professormust have a theory as a dog must have fleas."
- 50. Direct causes: practical problems contributingto disaster Long-term causes (dynamic pressures): predisposition to create disaster Root causes: motivating and underlying factors Local cascading effects National cascading effects International cascading effects Escalation factors Context PANARCHY
- 51. Evolutionary approach toemergency management Proxy Participatory Civil defence Civil protection Command and control Vertical chain of command Population excluded Law and order Secrecy Collaboration Task forces Population consulted and included Problem solving Openness
- 52. Operational Locally generated needs International liaison Locallygenerated needs Global monitoring and coordination Local response capacity Local response capacity Local response capacity Regional harmonisation Local response capacity Regional harmonisation National coordination CIVIL PROTECTION SYSTEM
- 53. LIFE SAVING RESPONSE • searchand rescue • crisis evacuation • medical surge capacity • intensive care capacity • epidemiology and disease prevention DAMAGE LIMITATION • infrastructure protection • impact reduction measures • bracing of damaged structures LAUNCHING RECOVERY • route clearance • infrastructure repair • debris management EMERGENCY RESPONSE CAPACITY AND CAPABILITY
- 54. The future willnot be the same as the past, but the lessons of the past will still be perfectly valid. Human safety will require massive investments and a much more serious approach.
- 55. Edward S. Hermanand Noam Chomsky 1988. Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media. Pantheon Books, New York. Central question:- What is the value and impact of good, ‘hard’ scientific information in a [digital] age of relativism, extremism and a lack of clear morality?
- 56. Thank you for listening! david.alexander@ucl.ac.uk Driving forward the agenda indisaster risk reduction.