1. Societal resilience analysis
LESSON 6
Societal resilience analysis

2. Lesson overview Background: what is societal resilience?
Analysis of societal resilience
IMPROVER Societal Resilience Analysis (ISRA)

3. What is societal resilience?
1. Background
What is societal resilience?

4. Societal resilience Definition of resilience (UNISDR):
“The ability of a system, community or society exposed to hazards to resist, absorb, accommodate, adapt to, transform and recover from the effects of a hazard in a timely and efficient manner, including through the preservation and restoration of its essential basic structures and functions through risk management.”
Resilience is…
Not a state, rather a way of managing an uncertain future
Not a quick fix
An emergent property of actions and relations on every level of society
Should be considered both on an individual, organizational and societal level
Keck, M. & P. Sakdapolrak (2013). What is social resilience? lessons learned and ways forward. Erdkunde 67(1), 5–19

5. Transformative capacity
Societal resilience
Three kinds of capacities to deal with threats more competently:
Coping capacity
Adaptive capacity
Transformative capacity
Coping capacity
Adaptive capacity
Transformative capacity
Keck, M. & P. Sakdapolrak (2013). What is social resilience? lessons learned and ways forward. Erdkunde 67(1), 5–19

6. Coping capacity
The ability of social actors to cope with and overcome all kinds of adversities.
The ability to respond, absorb and recover from a disruptive event and is related to a time frame close to the event.
Temporary solutions.
Keck, M. & P. Sakdapolrak (2013). What is social resilience? lessons learned and ways forward. Erdkunde 67(1), 5–19

7. Adaptive capacity
Pro-active or preventive measures employed to learn from past experiences.
Anticipation of future risks and ability to adjust livelihoods accordingly.
Involves strategic activity and more long-term planning.
Keck, M. & P. Sakdapolrak (2013). What is social resilience? lessons learned and ways forward. Erdkunde 67(1), 5–19

8. Transformative capacity
Ability to access assets and assistance from a wider socio-political field.
Participation in decision making processes.
Development of societal robustness toward future crisis.
Main difference between adaptive and transformative capacity lies in the degree of change and the outcome it denotes.
Keck, M. & P. Sakdapolrak (2013). What is social resilience? lessons learned and ways forward. Erdkunde 67(1), 5–19

9. Societal resilience and critical infrastructure (CI)
Indicators related to critical infrastructure are often included in societal resilience assessment frameworks
Increasing the resilience of CI therefore serves to increase societal resilience
Enhancing societal resilience serves to increase the coping capacity of the end users of CI services (the general public)
Positive feedback loop between the two types of resilience
Societal resilience
Critical infrastructure resilience

10. 2. Analysis of societal resilience

11. Analysis of societal resilience
There are no generally agreed upon metrics in the field of societal resilience
Indicators can be an effective tool to:
Help decision makers understand where their community lies in terms of resilience
As a base for developing plans and strategies to enhance resilience
The analysis should be able to inform a community on how to enhance coping, adaptive and transformative capacities

12. Resilience dimensions
Resilience is by definition a multi-dimensional topic
Resilience assessment should ideally include all dimensions and their interdependencies
To be able to operationalize the resilience concept, six major societal resilience dimensions have been identified:
Social capital
Human capital
Natural capital
Economic capital
Political capital
Physical capital

13. Social capital Quality and quantity of social networks and relations
Trust within the community
Informal social processes both on individual and community level
“A well-developed social capital shows the ability to rely on others in times of crisis, and an open communication between different stakeholder groups in the community”

14. Human capital Comprises education, knowledge, skills of work force
Health of the working-age population
Can be attained both on an individual and community level
“The human capital in a community forms a basis for the productivity of other kinds of capitals by, for example, providing a skilled and experienced work force for capacity building and economic development”

15. Natural capital
Natural resources e.g. land, water, forest, environmental services
Land use and environmental planning can have mitigating effects on natural hazards
E.g. wetlands and vegetation cover can decrease the impacts of floods and hurricanes.
“Societal resilience is directly linked to the maintenance of natural resources and the state of the natural environment”

16. Economic capital
Financial resources that communities and households use to achieve their livelihoods
Includes savings, credits, income and investments.
Can directly reduce vulnerabilities by e.g. insurances or by investment in protected buildings and infrastructure
“The connection to resilience is quite straight-forward as economic capital increases the ability to absorb impacts and speed up the recovery process”

17. Political capital Concerns both formal and informal power relations
Public access to, and influence on, the political system
Both at local and higher level
Regulatory measures should reflect the needs of all parts of the community
“Public involvement in decision making and implementation of plans is a key factor to ensure mutual trust between authorities and the public”

18. Physical capital
Refers to infrastructure and other basic services in a society
“In the IMPROVER Societal Resilience Analysis, the physical capital is measured by critical infrastructure resilience assessments”

19. 3. IMPROVER Societal Resilience Analysis (ISRA)

20. Aim of using ISRA
ISRA is developed to be used as a self-assessment by rating a set of indicators from strongly agree to strongly disagree
The proposed aim of using ISRA is to:
Develop a common understanding of societal resilience
Establish the current position (the result of the analysis)
Identify issues and needs to be addressed
Agree on an action plan to move forward
Review progress (compare results over time)
The assessment is intended to be performed by a group of people with different areas of expertise on a local or regional level.

21. Structure of ISRA
The starting point is to analyse a community’s perceived capability to react, adapt and recover from a shock.

22. Discussion questions 1 2 3
What are the differences between coping, adaptive, and transformative capacity?
Why is societal resilience of interest to a critical infrastructure operator?
What could a societal resilience analysis be used for?

23. Improved risk evaluation and implementation of resilience concepts to critical infrastructure