Perspectives on Resilience to Disasters across Sectors and Cultures

Abstract

"We present some insights on the use and interpretation of resilience ideas that arose in a conference on 'Societys Resilience in Withstanding Disaster.' Three points in particular have relevance for those interested in resilience in social-ecological systems: (1) Time as a threshold vs. avoiding quick fixes; (2) Trading risks: specified vs. general resilience; (3) Response origination: building local general resilience, and general resilience in central agencies. In the latter the need is to allow improvisation, and failure, during times of crisis."