Questioning the Diffusion of Resilience Discourses in Pursuit of Transformational Change

Abstract

Desirable responses to global environmental challenges are increasingly being characterized as requiring transformational social change. Keeping pace with this growing imperative, discourses of resilience are shifting away from an emphasis on durability toward more progressive themes. After briefly revisiting the interdisciplinary origin of social-ecological resilience, some lingering concerns about its theoretical underpinnings and practical implications are raised. With the theme of transformational change in mind, two sets of questions are posed—aiming to stimulate discussion of resilience as a boundary object, and resilience in practice. The first set of questions is intended to draw attention to differences between analysis and normativity in resilience discourses, as well as to how this plays out across different scales. The latter questions problematize the predominance of localism in resilience discourses and seek to advance the critique of its inherent neoliberalism.