RESILIENCE THINKING EMBRACING CHANGE, TRANSFORMING THE CITY ILASA INDABA

EDNA PERES

2014

A GLOBAL SYSTEM IN CRISIS

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RESILIENCE

LENSES

RESILIENCE

LENSES

RESILIENCE LENS - A PERSPECTIVE FOR TACKLING UNPRECIDENTED CHALLENGES

RESILIENCE

?

RESILIENCE (noun)

1. The mental ability to recover

quickly from depression, illness or

misfortune

2. The physical property of material

that can resume its shape after

being stretched or deformed;

elasticity

3. The positive ability of a system

or company to adapt itself to the

consequences of a catastrophic

failure.

WHAT IS

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ITS EARLY BEGINNINGS…

“…[it is] our responsibility to deal more kindly with one

another and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the

only home we've ever known”

Carl Sagan

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1960s LIMITS TO GROWTH…

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SOCIAL ECONOMIC

ENVIRONMENTAL

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CLASSIC SUSTAINABILITY MODEL

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SOCIAL

ECONOMIC

ENVIRO

NMENT

AL 7

REALITY…

ENVIRONMENTAL

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ECONOMIC

SOCIAL

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ECOLOGICAL SUSTAINABILITY

BACKGROUND TO RESILIENCE 1960s - along with sustainability and systems thinking, resilience emerges in ecological studies

1973 – Ecologist, Crawford Holling introduces resilience as an equilibrist descriptive ecological term (also

used in engineering resilience)

1975 – Anthropology

1986 onwards – Environmental Psychology, human geography, management, property- and human sciences

2005 – “Bounce-back-ability” of cities (Vale & Campanella)

2009 – Evolutionary resilience (Scheffer)

2010 – Social-Ecological resilience (Folke)

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CURRENT TRENDS

“The concept of resilience is one of the most important research topics in the context of achieving

sustainability” (Perrings et al. 1995, Kates et al. 2001, Foley et al. 2005)

Making cities more resilient to climate change ... An exploration of good practices and policy examples

from Latin Ameria, and an exchange of experience from other countries, in relation to making cities more

resilient to climate change. ELLA – Latin America

BUT HOW DOES RESILIENCE MANIFEST WITHIN THE BUILT ENVIRONMENT?

RESILIENCE

? ENGINEERING

EMERGENCIES

ECOLOGY

SYSTEMS

PSYCHOLOGY

BUSINESS

And….

BUILDINGS

1970’S

URBAN RESILIENCE HAS POTENTIAL TO

COMBINE ALL OF THESE ASPECTS OF RESILIENCE

BY

STRENGTHENING POSITIVE PARTS

OF THE CITY SYSTEM THAT NEED TO BE MORE RESILIENT

AND

DECREASING RESILIENCE IN THOSE THAT ARE

NEGATIVELY AFFECTING THE CITY SYSTEM

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URBAN RESILIENCE THINKING CORE IDEAS: Value neutral concept that represents the strength and weakness of a system, to help us make decisions on how to navigate (and hopefully thrive in) an uncertain future. Resilience is neither good or bad: perceiving something to be good or bad, comes down to our collective values, morals and ethics, not resilience.

SO LET’S DIVE IN!

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ECOLOGICAL WORLDVIEW

“THE IDEA OF AN INTERDEPENDENT AND INTERCONNECTED LIVING WORLD

IN WHICH HUMANS ARE AN INTEGRAL PART OF NATURE AND PART OF THE

PROCESSES OF COCREATION AND CO-EVOLUTION THAT SHAPE THE WORLD”

(DU PLESSIS, 2011)

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LIVING SYSTEMS

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SOCIAL-ECOLOGICAL SYSTEM

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HUMAN AND NON-HUMAN SYSTEMS IN PARTNERSHIP

SPECIFIC

RESILIENCE

GENERAL

RESILIENCE

URBAN RESILIENCE

?

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MULTI-SCALE

Gunderson & Holling (2002) 20

PANARCHY

Image: http://news.noahraford.com/?p=648

TH

E P

HA

SE

S O

F T

HE

AD

AP

TIV

E C

YC

LE -

HO

LLIN

G (

1986

)

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ADAPTIVE CYCLE

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REORGANISATION

GROWTH RELEASE

CONSERVATION

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IDENTIFY LEVERAGE POINTS IN THE SYSTEM FOR

EXPERIEMENTATION LEVERAGE POINTS + EXPERIMENTATION

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Residential Industry Green Commerce

Shack Pavement Seamstress Window box

Townhouse Cooperative Garden Spaza shop

Mansion Factory Local park Formal shop

Apt. building Multinational Reserve Chain

FUNCTIONAL DIVERSITY

Chrisna du Plessis (2009)

Informal-Formal Continuum

•Regulation/Governance

•Networks

•Built form

Diversity and population

Adaption rate

Time to establish

Time (adaption rate)

Siz

e or

Sca

le

Shopping Centre

Township retailer

Spaza/tuck shops

Street Trader

Mobile street trader

High

Low

High

Low

Sou

rce:

Ada

pted

from

Elm

qvis

t et a

l., 2

003

By

Alb

ert F

erre

ira 2

013

RETAIL RESPONSE DIVERSITY

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FORM + TYPOLOGY

ADAPTIVE VS. INFLEXIBLE

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ALLOW FOR EVOLUTION

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THE STORY OF PLACE

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TRANSFORM IN RESPONSE TO THESE CIRCUMSTANCES IN ORDER TO

MAINTAIN OR IMPROVE ITS INTEGRITY. [PERES]

THE RESILIENCE STORY OF PLACE

….THE CAPACITY OF A SYSTEM, ENTERPRISE, OR A PERSON TO MAINTAIN ITS

CORE PURPOSE AND INTEGRITY IN THE FACE OF DRAMATICALLY CHANGED

CIRCUMSTANCES…[ZOLLI] OR

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EMBRACE ECOLOGICAL SYSTEMS

MACHINARIUM BY HEIDI VAN EEDEN (2014)

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BUILD ON SOCIAL PRACTICES

LIQUID NETWORK BY MARIE CRONJE (2014)

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LEAVE ROOM FOR…

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TAKE HOME MESSAGES…

Resilience offers the opportunity to

transform our systems to something

new, positive, and with the capacity to

evolve.

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Blog - THINK TANK ON RESILIENT URBAN SYSTEMS IN TRANSITION

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