Reconciling resilience Helen Ross Professor of Rural Community Development The University of Queensland, Australia
Floating villages, Ha Long Bay, Vietnam
Overview • Introduction to resilience in different fields – Psychology-mental health – social-ecological systems – disaster management
• Studies to understand and manage for community and social resilience (Australia) • Ideas for reconciling resilience thinking across fields
My journey (with collaborators and communities) • Stanthorpe, SE Queensland Australia – What makes a community resilient? How are community and individual resilience related? How do we build it?
• North Queensland – What makes a region resilient? How are community and regional resilience related? How can organisations build the resilience of places and communities in their regions?
• Berkes and Ross community resilience series – How can we integrate ecological and social perspectives on resilience? – What research methods can we use to understand community resilience? – How does community resilience relate to other levels in a multi-level world?
One or many concepts of resilience? Social-ecological systems (complex and adaptive, multi-level)
Psychology-mental health (strengths-based, individuals, now communities)
Disaster--management (engineering resilience + household roles + responsibility sharing) Image: http://sportsnutritioninsider.insidefitnessmag.com/5050/an-ode-to-nutrient-timing
Resilience from social science perspectives (psychology, mental health) • Derives from child development • Focus on individual people’s strengths, personal and community processes of becoming resilient (overcoming adversities) – Now stretching to communities
• Main influence on disaster literature
Photo: Stanthorpe high school students
A definition: “the processes of, capacity for, or outcome of, successful adaptation despite challenging or threatening circumstances� (Masten et al. 1990)
Aim: to understand these strengths and resilience-forming processes, so as to build them
Resilience from a social-ecological systems perspective • Comes from ecology, recognises people – About the ‘coupled’ relationship between people and environment
• Based in complexity theory – Complex adaptive systems – Relation to sustainability Winnipeg, Canada, 2013
Addressing salinity: Western Australia
• Definition: the ability of a system to absorb disturbances, be changed and then re-organise while retaining its same basic essential structure and function.... (Resilience Alliance) • Aim: to understand resilience processes, so as to avoid dangerous system collapses (or support healthy transformations)
The disaster management literature • Mainly applies the psychology literature – also engineering resilience, for infrastructure – A few authors now recognise the social-ecological
• Most uses ‘resilience’ rather vaguely • Most considers ‘the community’ as ‘the public’ – not as a socially-bonded and co-operating set of people.
• Focuses strongly on planning, communication – less on the community or how it perceives, organises and recovers
Brisbane 2011 floods and ‘mud army’ The Australian
Social resilience “how individuals, communities and societies adapt, transform, and potentially become stronger when faced with environmental, social, economic or political challenges� (Ross et al. 2010).
Resilience: Aboriginal economy old (fish traps) and new (tourism), Hinchinbrook Island (Photos Kirsten Maclean)
Community resilience • the “existence, development and engagement of community resources by community members to thrive in an environment characterized by change, uncertainty, unpredictability and surprise.” (Magis 2010, p. 401 in Society & Natural Resources) • “a process linking a set of adaptive capacities to a positive trajectory of functioning and adaptation in constituent populations after a disturbance” (Norris et al. 2008, p. 127 in Am. J. Commun. Psychol) Communities as social entities, with often complex composition Communities of place, interest Interdependence with other levels (household, individual, region, global)
Community resilience* (Berkes and Ross 2013, Society and Natural Resources)
* Reconciling ecological and social science views
Example studies 1. Stanthorpe, Queensland Australia 2. Great Barrier Reef and Wet Tropics region
Opera in the vineyards, Stanthorpe (photo Helen Ross)
Conference run by Girringun Aboriginal Corporation, Cardwell, October 2007 (Photo Kirsten Maclean)
1. Participatory action research with Stanthorpe community, SE Queensland Local government area • Population 10,000 (4000 in town) • Cultural diversity (Italian and other) • Disadvantaged • Cool climate, natural beauty • Agriculture – fruit, wine • Tourism • Bushfire (about 2002), periodic hail and frosts • A well-connected, self-organising community Many societies, much volunteering Photos: Google images
Stanthorpe
Method Participatory action research, with the Stanthorpe community Three phases 1. Interviews with resilient people (analysis of themes from these interviews) – one
focus group and ten individual interviews (14 people)
2. Interviews with six groups (75 people) Service providers Youth Farming
Special needs (aged, disabilities) The commercial sector Resilient individuals
3. Development and preliminary evaluation of a toolkit – Workshops to discuss the concepts – Youth photovoice
Resilience concepts found 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11.
Social Networks and Support Positive Outlook Learning Early Experience Environment and Lifestyle Infrastructure and Support Services Sense of Purpose Diverse and Innovative Economy Embracing Differences Beliefs Leadership
Hegney et al 2008, http://learningforsustainability.net/
Building resilience in rural communities toolkit (Hegney et al. 2008)
Toolkit logic (social networks and support)
2. Far North Queensland – understanding social resilience in regional context (for regional managers)
Far North Queensland Resilience challenges
• Serious water quality issues for the Reef • Climate change imperative • Rapid regional change • Cyclones (Larry 2006, Yasi 2011) • Lack of social knowledge to inform policy, planning
Research process Participatory research with regional organisations that wanted to manage for social resilience World Heritage Area Managers (Reef, Rainforest) Aboriginal organisations Regional collaboration for natural resource management Department of Communities (planners)
Six case studies Water management, and Deregulation of dairy industry
Urban expansion Change in land tenure - Wet Tropics
Crown of thorns starfish outbreak
Key strengths identified • • • • • •
People-place connections Knowledge, skills and learning Community networks Engaged governance A diverse and innovative economy Community infrastructure Includes some processes • collaborating, connecting
Ross et al. (2010)
Self-organising and agency in our case studies • Stanthorpe – Many community organisations with many people involved, get together to solve problems – Community comes out spontaneously whenever members have a crisis (e.g. hail storms, the 2002 bushfire)
• North Queensland – Communities and organisations came together to organise solutions to environmental, policy and socio-economic crises • • • •
Crown of Thorns starfish – tourist operators with government Dairy restructuring – community, using their hall Wet Tropics forestry community – started a dance class Girringun – Aboriginal people started their own organisation for
‘healthy country, healthy people’
Reconciling resilience Social-ecological systems
Psychology-mental health
Community resilience model (Berkes and Ross, Society and Natural Resources, 2013) The social within the socialecological system
Berkes and Ross (2013), building on Ross et al. (2010) and Buikstra et al. (2010)
An integrated view of community resilience (Berkes and Ross 2013) • For place-based communities: – environment-social (and economic) relationship
• We are interested in theory and practice (helping) • Communities can actively develop resilience by drawing on their strengths (up to a point) • Generalised and specified resilience both important – how do they combine? • Need to understand the principles of complexity – E.g. feedbacks, non-linearity, unpredictability, and scale
Reconciling resilience Social-ecological systems
Psychology-mental health
Disaster--management
Suggestions (confidential, work in progress)
• Treat a ‘natural’ disaster as a periodic feature of the system – not an aberration or surprise – a particular period in people-environment relationship – can trigger re-organisation (window of opportunity)
• Identify, and build, the adaptive capacities, community agency, and confidence to self-organise – Building generalised resilience (or adaptive capacity) for all times, would help specified resilience for a disaster e.g. flood
Cont. • Redesign multi-level cooperation across what communities know about and do best, and what governments (and industry) do well • Built and natural environments – Adapt to the system risks – Don’t build on the floodplain, or build in ways that cope and recover? – Consider how conserved environments can mitigate hazards, e.g. mangroves in cyclones • Or choose species that survive, e.g. hoop pines in Cyclone Larry, Queensland
– Have plans ready to rebuild differently • rather than replace exactly
Managing for (or fostering) resilience
Photos Hinchinbrook passage Far North Queensland, and Girringun Board meeting, Arturo Izurieta
1. Community level Community development (capacity building) approaches build the strengths support for self-organising Community-based planning local knowledge and ownership towards relevant plans
Toolkit approach
2. For managers (Ross et al. 2010)
1. Know (acknowledge) resilience Pursue existing mandates in consciousness of social-ecological characteristics, without trying to intervene
2. Use it Take advantage of resilience characteristics in management strategies
3. Grow it Pursue organisational mandates in a new way that enhances social-ecological resilience
e.g. strengthening social networks while improving environment Identify social networks, and place attachment Engage community groups in mutually relevant landscape endeavours Grow them – e.g. seed and support new groups where networks needed
Photos: Helen Ross, Ian Beitz
Strengthening people-place connections • Activities and dissemination of information that build a stronger sense of and pride in place, make people feel part of their area and treasure the natural resources there – Or for disasters – also living with the risks
e.g. the Cassowary coast, Qld Cassowary crossing on Barron R. (CMA)
- Also cyclone area
Conclusions (and challenges) • Resilience should be considered in a complex adaptive systems context • An integrated view of resilience would – Identify and build on system strengths – Understand the couplings of ecological and social dynamics – Bring in un-recognised factors (e.g. power, economics, mental models) – Recognise and work with relationships with other levels – prepare for disasters but also prepare for all eventualities (specified and generalised resilience)
• We need to understand more about self-organising, social networks, power, collaboration, social learning...at multiple levels
Team and project acknowledgements Stanthorpe project (Australian Research Council) Stanthorpe Community Queensland Health Lifeline Combined Rural Traders Team: Desley Hegney, Elizabeth Buikstra, Cath Rogers-Clark, Peter Baker, Christine King, Kath McLachlan
Fikret Berkes
Marine and Tropical Scientific Research Facility Project, FNQ (Commonwealth funding) Reef and Rainforest Research Centre Terrain NRM Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority Wet Tropics Management Agency Girringun Aboriginal Corporation Department of Communities Team: Michael Cuthill, Kirsten Maclean, Bradd Witt + Margaret Gooch, Tim Lynam
References Stanthorpe study Buikstra E, Ross, H., King, C.A., Baker, P.G., Hegney, D., McLachlan, K. and Rogers-Clark C. 2010. ‘The Components of Resilience: Perceptions of an Australian Rural Community’, Journal of Community Psychology, 38,8, 975-991. Hegney, D., Ross H., Baker, P., Rogers-Clark, C., King, C., Buikstra, E., Watson-Luke, A., Mclachlan, K. and L. Stallard 2008a. Identification of personal and community resilience that enhance psychological wellness: A Stanthorpe study. Centre for Rural and Remote Area Health, The University of Queensland and University of Southern Queensland, Toowoomba. http://www.usq.edu.au/crrah/publications/2008 Hegney, D., Ross, H., Baker, P., Rogers-Clark, C., King, C., and E. Buikstra 2008b. Building Resilience in Rural Communities Toolkit. Toowoomba, Queensland: The University of Queensland and University of Southern Queensland. http://www.usq.edu.au/crrah/publications/2008
Far North Queensland study Ross H., M. Cuthill, K. Maclean, D. Jansen, and B. Witt 2010. Understanding, enhancing and managing for social resilience at the regional scale: opportunities in North Queensland. Report to the Marine and Tropical Sciences Research Facility. Reef and Rainforest Research Centre Ltd, Cairns. http://www.rrrc.org.au/publications/social_resilience_northqueensland.html
Maclean K., Ross H., Cuthill M. and Rist P. 2012, Healthy country, healthy people: An Australian Aboriginal organisation’s adaptive governance to enhance its social–ecological system, Geoforum, 45: 94-105. Maclean K., Cuthill M. and Ross H. 2014, Six attributes of social resilience, Journal of Environmental Planning and Management, 57(1): 144-156. Berkes and Ross Berkes F. and Ross H. 2013, Community resilience: Toward an integrated approach, Society and Natural Resources, 26:1, 5-20 Ross H. and Berkes F. 2014, online first, Research approaches for understanding, enhancing and monitoring community resilience, Society and Natural Resources.
Other references Kulig team • •
•
Kulig, J. C., Hegney D. and Edge D.S. 2010, Community resiliency and rural nursing: Canadian and Australian perspectives. In Rural Nursing: concepts, theory and practice, 3rd edition, eds. C. A. Winters and H. J. Lee, pp. 385-400. New York: Springer. Kulig, J. C. 2000, Community resiliency: The potential for community health nursing theory development. Public Health Nursing, 17(5), 374-385. Kulig, J. C., Edge, D., & Guernsey, J. 2005, Community resiliency and health status: What are the links? Lethbridge: University of Lethbridge.
Others • •
•
Brown K. and Westaway E. 2011, Agency, capacity, and resilience to environmental change: lessons from human development, well-being, and disasters. Annual Review of Environment and Resources 36: 321-42. Masten, A. S., Best, K., & Garmezy, N. 1990, Resilience and development: Contributions from the study of children who overcame adversity. Development and Psychopathology, 2, 425-444. Sendzimir, J., Reij C. P., and Magnuszewski P. 2011, Rebuilding resilience in the Sahel: regreening in the Maradi and Zinder regions of Niger. Ecology and Society 16(3):1. http://www.ecologyandsociety.org/vol16/iss3/art1/
Thank you for having me Helen Ross Helen.Ross@uq.edu.au +61 408 195 324