Narrow Results

Across three years (2017–2020), the ESRC Seminar series, “Civil Agency, Society and Climate Adaptation to Weather Extremes” (CASCADE-NET) critically examined the changing role of civil society in extreme weather adaptation. One full-day seminar explored “less heard voices” within Civil Society, considering ways of engaging diverse groups in resiliency, knowledge exchange, and capacity building. A small interdisciplinary group from the seminar followed up with a roundtable discussion, conducted online, discussing first who the less-heard voices in society are, and how labels, such as “vulnerable” and “hard to reach”, might need to be reappraised, and concluding that it is often those in power who make themselves “hard to reach” and who fail to listen. The group then discussed how deeper engagement with citizens and communities can be achieved through improved relationships and networks. Finally, the roundtable discussed how the succession of crises affecting the UK (and other settings) could, paradoxically, present an opportune moment to press the case for a more joined-up and inclusive civil society. The concluding section summarizes key insights from the roundtable and identifies opportunities to rethink engagement with “hard to reach” groups. To answer our question of “how to” engage diverse groups, we conclude with the action points to change the orientation of the powerful to (i) be genuinely open to listening to, and acting upon the voices of less heard groups; (ii) listen on the terms of groups who are voicing their experience, rather than force them into pre-arranged consultation formats; (iii) engage early, widely and frequently; (iv) build trust by demonstrating willingness to listen, through actions; (v) tackle historical mistrust, unequal resources, experiences of neglect or exploitation that undermine groups’ interest in engaging with the powerful. A transformation in orientation to community engagement is in order if we are to produce effective, locally attuned, collective action in the face of social shocks.

Cities today face significant difficulties and even risks due to the negative effects of climate change, uncontrolled urbanization, and rapid population growth. Many urban scenarios are being developed to mitigate potential risks and threats. One branch of these scenarios is built upon the concept of sustainability, for which the notion of “resilience” is of utmost importance. It is this notion of resilience that was examined in this study, based on the case of socio-ecological system features of Edremit, Van, Turkey. These features were evaluated in terms of changes that will potentially take place, and the analysis for this was performed using the Green Infrastructure Spatial Planning (GISP) method. In this approach, green infrastructure benefit criteria are mapped in the Geographic Information System (GIS) environment and various conclusions are drawn from the evaluation of these maps. The results of the study show that the green infrastructure systems of Edremit play an important role in providing a certain degree of resilience. It was, therefore, revealed as part of this study that measuring and evaluating the resilience properties of different cities is important. Also, urban policies and spatial strategies should be defined considering local characteristics and values as there is no one-size-fits-all solution in this regard.

Urban infrastructure is the lifeline and material foundation for the normal operation of cities. It is of great significance to accurately evaluate the resilience level of urban infrastructure and identify the main obstacle factors for the construction of resilient cities. This paper establishes an index system for urban infrastructure resilience evaluation from three dimensions: Pre-disaster prevention capacity, disaster resistance capacity, and post-disaster recovery capacity. It also uses the CRITIC method to determine the index weights and identifies the main obstacle factors based on the obstacle degree model (ODM). The results show that urban infrastructure resilience in China is generally low and varies greatly in terms of structure across provinces and municipalities. The main obstacle factors affecting urban infrastructure resilience include the capacities to conduct pre-disaster prevention and post-disaster recovery in the production and supply of electricity, gas and water, to construct infrastructure recovery projects, and to ensure energy supply and power supply. It is recommended to promote the application of the concept of “resilience” throughout the entire process of urban planning, construction and governance, understand the current situation of urban infrastructure, coordinate the investment of resources such as funding, manpower and technology, enhance the robustness and redundancy of urban infrastructure systems, actively optimize the layout of urban infrastructure, and continuously improve the application of intelligent technologies in infrastructure systems.

One of the main challenges facing rural areas in Iran is a lack of disaster risk management. This calls for a comprehensive framework for assessing resilience in small communities. This study seeks to establish such a framework based on the general principles of the Sendai Framework. So, an attempt is made to use a combination of quantitative and qualitative methods to operationalize and score indicators and risk management components, and then choose one of the rural areas in northern Iran as a sample for the framework’s implementation. The results show that a resilience assessment on small communities should do two things: outline the resilience situation and create a platform for dialogue and mutual thinking. Residents should be able to talk about risk reduction continuously and purposefully and take small, purposeful steps in this direction. It seems that Iran’s centralized planning system is more flexible in entrusting affairs to small communities and is more likely to form active cooperative cores. For this reason, it can be seen that voluntary activities have played an essential role in providing social services during the COVID-19 pandemic and quarantine period, and the volunteers themselves have also benefited from voluntary activities. As a result, volunteer groups have gained opportunities to promote local development and foster ownership and responsibility. However, there are concerns about the sustainability of these activities, which are related to the two issues of ensuring financial stability and providing volunteers in the long term.

The concept of environmental water requirements (EWRs) is central to Australia’s present approach to water reform. Current decision-making regarding environmental water relies strongly on the notion that EWRs necessary to meet targets associated with ecological objectives for asset sites can be scientifically defined, thus enabling the ecological outcomes of alternative water management scenarios to be evaluated in a relatively straightforward fashion in relation to these flow thresholds or targets. We argue, however, that the ecological objectives and targets currently underpinning the development of EWRs in the Murray-Darling Basin are insufficient to permit the identification of exact water requirements or flow thresholds. Because of the dynamic and heterogeneous nature of the Murray-Darling Basin and the myriad ways in which it is valued by people, we also assert that it is unlikely that adequate ecological objectives and targets from which to determine EWRs could ever be formulated. We suggest that the current emphasis on the concept of EWRs in environmental water planning conflates science and values, perpetuating a “how much is enough?” myth whereby the significance of the social, cultural and political dimension in environmental decision-making is diminished. We support an alternative paradigm in which the contribution of ecological science to water policy and management decisions focuses on understanding ecological responses of water-dependent ecosystems and their biota to alternative management scenarios and linking these responses to the ecosystem services and human values which they support.

The continually worsening threat of the impacts of climate change will have detrimental impacts on the ability of emergency managers to prepare for and respond to various disasters. Emergency management in the climate change era is at the intersection of human interaction and the physical world. Emergency managers must be able to understand the threats and vulnerabilities of the natural hazards that may exist in a community as well how the public will respond to any threats. There are unique collaborations between human, social, and economic vulnerabilities that outline a country's resilience to a disaster. Climate change has the potential to cause devastating consequences for the health, security, and stability of a nation. Emergency preparedness and response officials must consider all the unique needs of their region when engaging in planning and recovery efforts in order to ensure resilience in the face of worsening threat matrices that are a complication of climate change.

Scholars suggest that only certain personality traits can easily adapt and react positively to organisational changes and consequently to innovative behaviour. Hence, in this study, we drew upon career construction theory to develop a hypothetical model examining how certain personality traits (i.e., curiosity, focus on opportunity, and resilience) are likely to influence career adaptability and consequently innovative behaviour. To test the model, we used two-wave longitudinal data focusing on 313 frontline employees operating in a random sample of five-star hotels in Dubai. Using Smart-PLS.3, we revealed that employees with a high level of curiosity, focus on opportunity, and resilience tend to increase the likelihood of their career adaptability significantly. In other words, employees with such work-related personality are more likely to adapt to organisational changes and fit different organisational environments. Furthermore, the result of the study found that career adaptability significantly mediated the relationship between these personality traits and innovative behaviour. The findings have significant implications for both theory and practice. They may also be contextual. These implications are discussed.

This chapter examines the impact of the recent global healthcare crisis on the resilience of the Islamic and conventional banks from the six GCC countries. We compare the financial ratios of the banks derived from the 3Q2020 financial statements of 51 publicly listed regional banks. The data numbers are annualized to cover banking activities in the region during the pandemic year. Analytical results suggest that GCC Islamic banks performed better than their conventional peers. GCC Islamic banks were strongly capitalized before the pandemic, except for Al Izz bank in Oman. Al Izz bank was also later merged with Oman Arab Bank. The fact that Islamic banks do not engage with derivatives also helped GCC Islamic banks remain robust during the crisis. Therefore, one would recommend that Islamic banks, along with the disruptive financial technology of the day (FinTech), can help the post-COVID-19 economic world to stabilize.

This chapter studies the use of a proposed integrated competency development approach to address the challenges which a bank’s risk management function faced during the COVID-19 pandemic. It studies the challenges and regulatory reforms after the 2008 Global Financial Crisis. It argues that these reforms were not sufficient to address the challenges in the longer term. It revisits the key features of the proposed integrated approach to risk management competency development. Next, it studies and identifies four major challenges together with the corresponding risk management competency development requirements. It finds that these requirements can be inferred from the proposed integrated approach. It proposes that this integrated approach is, and will likely remain, relevant to helping banks build resilience as they confront future pandemics and challenges.

Community resistance to, and resilience from, perturbation will determine the trajectory of recovery from disturbance. Although selective timber extraction is considered a severe disturbance, fish communities from headwater streams around Danum Valley Field Centre, Sabah, Malaysia, showed few long-term changes in species composition or abundance. However, some species showed short-term (< 18 months) absence or decrease in abundance. These observations suggested that both resistance and resilience were important in maintaining long-term fish community structure. Resistance to perturbation was tested by monitoring fish communities before and after the creation of log-debris dams, while resilience was investigated by following the time-course of recolonization following complete removal of all fish. High community resistance was generally shown although the response was site-specific, dependent on the composition of the starting community, the size of the stream and physical habitat changes. High resilience was demonstrated in all recolonization experiments with strong correlations between pre- and post-defaunation communities, although there was a significant difference between pool and riffle habitats in the time-course of recovery. These differences can be explained by the movement characteristics of the species found in the different habitats. Resilience appeared to be a more predictable characteristic of the community than resistance and the implications of this for ensuring the long-term persistence of fish in the area are discussed.

Although agricultural production contributed about 10% of all greenhouse gas emissions in the United States in 2019, existing agricultural practices are capable of making the sector carbon neutral. Whether American agriculture will ultimately achieve carbon neutrality is ultimately a question of political will, not a scientific one. Given the right policy environment, farms and ranches will be able to cut their emissions and use their land to sequester carbon, while becoming more climate resilient, productive, and profitable…

Through warming of the oceans, human-induced climate change effects accumulate. The result is higher ocean heat content (OHC), sea levels and sea surface temperatures (SSTs). The resulting environment invigorates tropical cyclones to make them more intense, bigger and longer lasting, and greatly increases their flooding rains. Here, the focus is on Atlantic hurricanes in 2017, featuring Harvey, Irma and Maria, and the huge damage that occurred. Hurricanes keep tropical oceans cooler as a consequence of their strong winds that increase evaporation. Planning for such supercharged hurricanes (adaptation) by increasing resilience (e.g., better building codes, flood protection) and preparing for contingencies (such as evacuation routes, power cuts) is essential but not adequate in many areas, including Texas, Florida and Puerto Rico where Harvey, Irma and Maria took their toll.

There is broad scientific consensus that climate change will continue over the next several decades even if greenhouse gas emissions are reduced drastically. The greatest human impacts of climate change are anticipated to be in low- and lower-middle-income countries. While reductions in emissions of greenhouse gases are essential, given the inevitability of climate change, a critical question is how societies can best adapt to climate change? In our accompanying main paper following this summary (Smith and Malik, 2019), we address this difficult question and many of the issues that it raises. We then describe some of the progress made thus far in addressing them.

New Jersey Board of Public Utilities (“Board”) is a state agency that oversees the public (investor-owned) utility companies supplying natural gas, electricity, water, telecommunications and cable television services. The Board ensures safe, adequate and proper utility services at reasonable rates for New Jersey residents. The Board protects consumers with competitive rates, and monitors service quality by responding to consumer complaints. The Board promotes clean, renewable sources of energy, incentivizes efficient use of energy and also conservation…

The crises that have occurred over the last decade revealed the rapidly changing array of threats that the world is facing. Whether we are talking about natural disasters, pandemics, terrorism, armed conflicts or financial crises, the crises that the world is facing today possess characteristics that are distinct from conventional crises. Besides dealing with these acute crises, the world is also faced with slow-burning or creeping crises, such as antibiotic resistance and greying population; these crises take time to develop but have damaging, irreversible effects if no immediate action is taken. The changing dynamics of modern crises raise new challenges for crisis management and leaders must be prepared to manage them. Although modern crises are increasingly unforeseeable and unpredictable, leaders are expected to have anticipated their occurrence and to mitigate the risks and damages. This chapter highlights five key points leaders should note about managing modern crises, and recommends five key approaches to managing them, centring around building resilience in people and systems to anticipate and prepare for these modern crises.

In view of the rise of extreme events and increasing frequency of transboundary crises occurring worldwide, crisis readiness becomes increasingly pertinent.

The aim of this study is to develop a questionnaire assessing the crisis ready mindset of Singaporean youths and examine how cognitive biases and cultural variables influence the crisis ready mindset.

A crisis ready mindset can be broken down into six dimensions:

• Perceived possibility of crises
• Preparation for crises
• Reaction to surprise element of crises
• Emotional reaction
• Cognitive processes
• Coping ability

To avoid cognitive biases in crisis readiness, there are strategies that can be undertaken at the individual and national level. On the individual level, the premortem technique can be adopted. Recommendations on crisis communications to the public will also be discussed.

The study has been taken up with a purpose to understand how a leader can behave during the times of crises. Such times may demand situational and unplanned decisions. Every crisis has different internal and external context; thus, leadership competences which can be useful in “normal” circumstances may not be fruitful in times of crises. However, there could be certain approaches/competences of leadership which can be generalised. The work is based on the review of literature and in-depth interviews with leaders from 23 organisations representing the Indian small and medium-sized enterprise sector. Lived experiences of the participants were captured in the form of narration to understand their role as a leader to keep their businesses alive during the COVID-19 pandemic. With the help of thematic coding, lessons were drawn to develop an understanding of the underlying key competences of a leader that can help to take firm actions during challenging situations. The findings of the study suggest that seven identified leadership competences (PREFACE) can be applied during a crisis to achieve a balance between people and organisational economy. These leadership competences can help in overcoming unforeseen situations to gain competitive advantage and survive challenges. The study holds some important practical implications. Such times like the one where the world is battling a deadly virus, agile and effective decisions need to be made. It should be noted that the post crisis world would also be filled with challenges, such as: lack of demand, lack of jobs, changed work habits and raised inequality. With the help of the suggested competences, one may find a ground to base his/her actions to overcome trials posed due to a crisis. This study addresses an important gap in the literature by presenting an overarching framework for the crisis leadership in the small and medium enterprise sector. This chapter, with the help of in-depth interviews, highlights some important leadership competences which can be helpful in handling crisis situations in small and medium enterprises.

Despite the growing protectionist policies from major developed and developing countries, multinational corporations (MNCs) tend to adjust their current efficiency-oriented global value chains (GVCs) to more resilient ones, instead of reshoring overseas businesses back home. In this respect, this chapter seeks to introduce a comprehensive framework across four directions: agile response, alternative routes, diversification, and sustainability orientation, for establishing resilient GVCs in the pandemic era. In reviewing and reorganizing the suggestions of existing studies, this chapter argues firms need to be more globalized while maintaining the key principles of GVCs. As such, countries will also need to improve their national business environment and make it more attractive for firms to locate parts of the entire GVCs in their countries. This chapter takes two countries: Vietnam and Singapore — as examples which have been widely recognized as successful countries that have opened up their economies and utilized international resources for economic development. This chapter shows that despite the potential challenges from the global pandemic, both countries tend to push forward the globalization of their economy and introduce various measures, such as strengthening the global relations with other economies and investments for digital transformations, to upgrade their positions in the GVCs.

The contemporary climate change crisis is fundamentally different from what is classically understood as natural disasters, which refer to events whose impacts are restricted in both time and space. In the Anthropocene epoch, climate change disasters are being interpreted in a new language of crisis and unknown risks; it is riddled with divergent interpretations of climate responsibilities and binary framings of utopian and dystopian future. This chapter argues that the tragedy of the commons on a planetary scale will be hard to avoid unless the ideological and political roots of present-day understanding of disasters are explored and rendered visible. The language of boundaries and limits which dominate the Anthropocene discourse tends to collide with the narratives of development and global distributive justice, which remain dominant in the Global South. This chapter argues that an ahistorical framing of the Anthropocene presents an analytical challenge to multiple disciplines and especially for the study of International Relations, where the collision of world history with planetary history will be the first to become most visible. The chapter contends that the politics of climate change that seems so far driven by dystopian/utopian futures tends to obfuscate the questions of moral culpability, accountability, and asymmetry of state power and climate justice, which must be the dominant concerns in the present.

Late-onset Alzheimer’s disease (LOAD) is a polygenic disorder with a long prodromal phase, making early diagnosis challenging. Twin studies estimate LOAD as 60-80% heritable, and while common genetic variants can account for 30% of this heritability, nearly 70% remains “missing”. Polygenic risk scores (PRS) leverage combined effects of many loci to predict LOAD risk, but often lack sensitivity to preclinical disease changes, limiting clinical utility. Our group has built and published on a resilience phenotype to model better-than-expected cognition give amyloid pathology burden and hypothesized it may assist in preclinical polygenic risk prediction. Thus, we built a LOAD PRS and a resilience PRS and evaluated both in predicting cognition in a dementia-free cohort (N=254). The LOAD PRS had a significant main effect on baseline memory (β=-0.18, P=1.68E-03). Both the LOAD PRS (β=-0.03, P=1.19E-03) and the resilience PRS (β=0.02, P=0.03) had significant main effects on annual memory decline. The resilience PRS interacted with CSF Aβ on baseline memory (β=-6.04E-04, P=0.02), whereby it predicted baseline memory among Aβ+ individuals (β=0.44, P=0.01) but not among Aβ- individuals (β=0.06, P=0.46). Excluding APOE from PRS resulted in mainly LOAD PRS associations attenuating, but notably the resilience PRS interaction with CSF Aβ and selective prediction among Aβ+ individuals was consistent. Although the resilience PRS is currently somewhat limited in scope from the phenotype’s cross-sectional nature, our results suggest that the resilience PRS may be a promising tool in assisting in preclinical disease risk prediction among dementia-free and Aβ+ individuals, though replication and fine-tuning are needed.