Durham University, Department of Geography Institute for Hazards, Risk and Resilience Seminar

1. Durham University, Department of Geography Institute for Hazards, Risk and Resilience Seminar 20 February, 2012 Adapting to Climate Change: From Resilience to Transformation Mark Pelling Department of Geography, King's College London 1. Positioning resilience and transformation 2. IPCC SREX 3. Transformation: a discourse gathering momentum? 4. Future scope for transformation and conclusions

2. Resilience? Source: Galderisi, 2011

3. Resilience as: • Bouncing back (disasters studies) • A learning system (climate change adaptation) • Social-ecological systems framing of resilience: • Objective: functional persistence • Through: systems learning and self-organization Three concerns for a (SES) resilience framing of adaptation: Functional persistence Bias towards the status quo in power relations and subsequent policy regimes Conceals inner worlds of affect and emotion Liable to downplay the significance of inner worlds in quality of life and for policy buy-in Technical optimism Can generate an exaggerated sense of order, understanding and control in policy and decision-making The emerging resilience framing for climate change adaptation/disaster risk reduction

4. A response: positioning resilience alongside transition and transformation

5. What might transformation look like?

6. IPCC Special Report for Managing the Risks of Extreme Events and Disasters to Advance Climate Change Adaptation (SREX) “Transformation involves fundamental changes to the attributes of a system, including value systems, regulatory, legislative or bureaucratic regimes, financial institutions and technological or biophysical systems”. Systems of interest: transformation of DRM/CCA and development Rationale: opens new scope for risk management when fundamental attributes of existing systems are found to be generative of unacceptable levels of risk or its distribution, or to constrain resilience. Key message: transformation is inevitable, it can be chosen or forced. - Deliberative transformation is likely to be more inclusive, holistic and sustainable.

7. Positioning transformation II

8. Evidence of transformationwhat, why, when, how, who? In DRM/CCA regimes Heat wave DRM in France: new risk management regime, from denial to integrated planning, but limited by knowledge on vulnerability production, and lack of facilitation for learning between cities internationally (Laaidi et al., 2004). Flood DRM in Bangladesh: evolving risk management regime has transformed local life through multifaceted, integrated DRM into development planning, but hazard remains high and vulnerability is growing with demographic changes (Paul 2009). DRM legislation in South Africa, new regime, but barriers in local implementation (Pelling and Holloway, 2006).

9. Evidence of transformation In DRM/CCA–development regimes Low quality of governance, and especially Voice and Accountability, has been highlighted as a major vulnerability component for human mortality due to tropical cyclones (Peduzziet al., 2009). In DRM/CCA-development-mitigation regimes Joined-up production-consumption systems for food, energy etc, e.g. REDD+ (Locatelli et al 2010)?

10. A Discourse Gathering Momentum? Empirical testing in DRM and SES Pelling and Manuel-Navarrete (2011) Ecology and Society 16 (2) Two Hurricane prone Mexican towns. Resilient social-political systems can prevent transformation to a more equitable and sustainable future through constraining critical consciousness and co-opting development narratives, agrevated where place identity and social capital are limited. O’Brien (2012) Progress in Human Geography, online 2011 Deliberate transformation – transformation will be chosen or forced. Moving from resilience as accommodating to transformation as contesting GEC.

11. A Discourse Gathering Momentum? Empirical testing in DRM and SES O’Neill and Handmer (2012) Environ. Res. Lett. (7) 2009 ‘Black Saturday’ bushfires, 172 civilian deaths. Transformative adaptation requires ‘deep shifts in the way people perceive themselves and the world’: diminish hazard, reduce exposure, reduce vulnerability of people, increase adaptive capacity of institutions. Walker (in press) Ecology and Society Socio-economic, cultural and environmental management shifts in two contemporary Australian ‘fragile towns’. Sees adaptive resilience and transformation as having some overlapping indicators (social capital and social networks), but also considers necessary conditions to include vision, identification with place and dissatisfaction with the status quo.

12. Future scope for transformation and conclusions A Straw Poll: Royal Geographical Society ‘the Perfect Storm’ , 09/02/2012: Resilience 2: Transformation 13 • Transformation as a policy project A meta-narrative for disaster management, adaptation, mitigation, poverty alleviation, political and economic renewal? 2. Building the evidence base Transformation is a rare systems event, evidence of transformative pathways, blockages etc. from multiple viewpoints. 3. Maturing the theory Linking across intellectual traditions – to answer and pose empirical questions.