Resilience of Rural Households: Insights from a Multidisciplinary Literature

Abstract

Due to the increase in both the frequency and severity of shocks and stressors that rural households are faced with, a vast array of studies has emerged in recent times on issues surrounding their resilience. Scholarship in this field has benefitted from insights from multiple disciplines including applied economics, disaster risk management, and human ecology, to name a few. These diverse contributions, although beneficial and necessary, have led to what appears to be discrepancies in the research arena. Using a bibliometric approach and thematic clustering, we shed light on the research landscape of rural household resilience. Furthermore, this article synthesizes some of the main contributions from various subfields and offers a systematic way for studies to approach the subject matter. From issues such as the objective and subjective dimensions of resilience characterization and measurement, to the degree of integration of the broader social ecological systems within which, households exist, the systematic classification of related concepts carried out in this article helps to organize knowledge, as well as aims to provide a guiding framework for future research and review efforts.