Ambivalence towards discourse of disaster resilience

Ruszczyk, H.A.

doi:10.1111/disa.12385

Ambivalence towards discourse of disaster resilience

Ruszczyk, H.A.

Authors

Dr Hanna Ruszczyk h.a.ruszczyk@durham.ac.uk
Post Doctoral Research Associate

Abstract

This paper investigates empirically how the international aid community (IAC)—donors and practitioners—considers and implements disaster resilience in a specific country setting, Nepal, and throughout the rest of the world. A key finding is that there is ambivalence about a concept that has become a discourse. On a global level, the IAC utilises the discourse of resilience in a cautiously positive manner as a bridging concept. On a national level, it is being used to influence the Government of Nepal, as well as serving as an operational tool of donors. The mythical resilient urban community is fashioned in the IAC's imaginary; understanding how people create communities and what type of linkages with government urban residents desire to develop their resilience strategies is missing, though, from the discussion. Disaster resilience can be viewed as another grand plan to enhance the lives of people. Yet, regrettably, an explicit focus on individuals and their communities is lost in the process.

Citation

Ruszczyk, H. (2019). Ambivalence towards discourse of disaster resilience. Disasters, 43(4), 818-839. https://doi.org/10.1111/disa.12385

Journal Article Type	Article
Acceptance Date	Sep 7, 2018
Online Publication Date	Jul 19, 2019
Publication Date	Oct 31, 2019
Deposit Date	Sep 7, 2018
Publicly Available Date	Jul 24, 2019
Journal	Disasters
Print ISSN	0361-3666
Electronic ISSN	1467-7717
Publisher	Wiley
Peer Reviewed	Peer Reviewed
Volume	43
Issue	4
Pages	818-839
DOI	https://doi.org/10.1111/disa.12385

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Copyright Statement
Advance online version © 2019 The Author(s). Disasters © Overseas Development Institute, 2019This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.