Resilience Activities Research Articles

ʻĀina as resilience: mapping community networks and collaborative care in Hawaiʻi

This article examines the growth of Indigenous grassroots community groups across Hawaiʻi, whose efforts are pivotal to place-based climate change resilience and community well-being. Instead of focusing on specific ecosystem resilience actions, it highlights the people and places that make this movement of community organizations resilient, leveraging both social and cultural strengths to adapt to climate impacts. For many Indigenous peoples, climate change is not new; adaptation has already been integral to relationships between environment and culture. These changes require culturally responsive approaches, not short-term engineering solutions such as coastal hardening or stream channelization. A collaboration between a grassroots artist mapping initiative (‘ĀINAVIS) and a university’s community-based research project (‘ĀINA KUPU), this study utilizes a novel data index compiled using publicly available information to inform a series of in-depth student interviews with community groups across Hawai‘i whose mission, vision, and work are dedicated to caring for ‘āina. We find that these “ʻĀina Organizations” articulate climate resilience in multi-faceted and culturally grounded ways, maintaining reciprocal and mutual relationships with ʻāina, the Hawaiian term for land meaning “that which feeds.” Facing various challenges and needing different systems of support, our work maps the dynamic adaptability of ‘āina expressed through community networks of collaborative care with emphasis on the importance of intergenerational knowledge and genealogical connection to place shared and passed onto future generations. The article concludes by emphasizing the importance of working on ‘āina as an exercise of Indigenous sovereignty, expanding climate resilience with cultural practice and social justice as both outcome and process of climate change adaptation.

Institutional (ante)narratives of anticipatory entrepreneurial resilience: COVID‐19 and the global entrepreneurship monitor

AbstractThe COVID‐19 crisis severely impacted entrepreneurs worldwide, so that policy dispatches like the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor's (GEM) September 2020 special report, Diagnosing COVID‐19 Impacts on Entrepreneurship: Exploring Policy Remedies for Recovery, were crucial for governments devising economic policies. Our paper examines how the GEM used institutional storytelling to craft anticipatory resilience, by drawing on the Communication Theory of Resilience and (ante)narrative approaches to anticipatory resilience. Findings demonstrated intersections of the GEM's role of resilience storyteller, as well as how resilience action by entrepreneurs and policymakers was narrated by the GEM. We uncover key tensions within the GEM's positioning as diagnostician and fortuneteller, between the resilient processes of normalizing and pivoting for everyday entrepreneurs, and in the institutionalizing work of policymakers through reacting and prospecting. We end by discussing key implications of our narrative approach to how institutions craft anticipatory resilience in response to global crises.

Human-Inspired Meta-Reinforcement Learning Using Bayesian Knowledge and Enhanced Deep Q-Network

Over the last decades, there has been growing interest in research in multiple and interdisciplinary fields of human-AI computing. In particular, approaches integrating human’s perspective and design with reinforcement learning (RL) have received more attention. However, the current research on RL may need to consider its enhancement from human-inspired approaches further. In this work, we focus on enabling a meta-reinforcement learning (meta-RL) agent to achieve adaptation and generalization, according to modeling Markov Decision Processes (MDP) using Bayesian knowledge and analysis. By introducing a novel framework called human-inspired meta-RL (HMRL), we incorporate the agent performing resilient actions to leverage the dynamic dense reward based on the knowledge and prediction of a Bayesian analysis. The proposed framework can make the agent learn generalization and prevent the agent from failing catastrophically. The experimental results show that our approach helps the agent reduce computational costs with learning adaptation. In addition to the system design, we have also extended further algorithmic improvement based on learning within a deep Q-network (DQN) implementations for more complicated future tasks, which compared replay buffers to possibly enhance the optimization process. Finally, we conclude and anticipate that integrating human-inspired meta-RL can enable learning more formulations relating to robustness and scalability, leading to promising directions and more complex AI goals in the future.

Addressing the Health Implications of Heat Waves: Urgent Actions for Protection and Resilience

Addressing the Health Implications of Heat Waves: Urgent Actions for Protection and Resilience

Mapping dust risk under heterogenous vulnerability to dust: The combination of spatial modelling and questionnaire survey

Dust storms are natural events that remove and relocate surface soil, damage vegetation crops, and disrupt many other aspects of the earth's terrestrial ecosystem. Despite the importance of the risk assessment of dust hazards, vulnerability modeling of them is very limited. For this reason, this study provides a conceptual model based on Structural Equation Modeling and the Finite Mixture Partial Least Squares (FIMIX-PLS) approach using interviews and questions for vulnerability modeling of dust in Ahvaz County, Khuzestan province, Iran. Key model drivers included Resilience Actions, Natural-Physical effects, Economic Influence, and Social Influence. The Aerosol Optical Depth (AOD) product of MODIS/Terra was used to develop a dust hazard map. MODIS/Terra performance was evaluated using observed PM10 data from Ahvaz County air pollution monitoring stations. Land use mapping was used for spatial detection of agricultural land affected by the intensity of the AOD map in the previous step. The vulnerability model fitting results showed that the model had acceptable validity (SRMR = 0.013). Results showed that approximately 25 % of agricultural lands are at high and very high dust hazard risk. Based on modeling results, natural-physical variables affect about 89 % and 97 % of social and economic drivers, respectively. Conversely, social influences significantly negatively affect dust storm resilience resulting in agricultural vulnerability. Based on results from the integrated model, strengthening farmers' resilience strategies against dust hazards requires additional research and attention.

Two Decades of Integrated Flood Management: Status, Barriers, and Strategies

Losses from flood disasters are increasing globally due to climate-driven forces and human factors such as migration and land use changes. The risks of such floods involve multiple factors and stakeholders, and frameworks for integrated approaches have attracted a global community of experts. The paper reviews the knowledge base for integrated flood risk management frameworks, including more than twenty bibliometric reviews of their elements. The knowledge base illustrates how integrated strategies for the reduction of flood risk are required at different scales and involve responses ranging from climate and weather studies to the construction of infrastructure, as well as collective action for community resilience. The Integrated Flood Management framework of the Associated Programme on Flood Management of the World Meteorological Organization was developed more than twenty years ago and is explained in some detail, including how it fits within the Integrated Water Resources Management concept that is managed by the Global Water Partnership. The paper reviews the alignment of the two approaches and how they can be used in tandem to reduce flood losses. Success of both integrated management approaches depends on governance and institutional capacity as well as technological advances. The knowledge base for flood risk management indicates how technologies are advancing, while more attention must be paid to social and environmental concerns, as well as government measures to increase participation, awareness, and preparedness. Ultimately, integrated flood management will involve solutions tailored for individual situations, and implementation may be slow, such that perseverance and political commitment will be needed.

Review of metrics to assess resilience capacities and actions for supply chain resilience

Efficiency and profitability are the main drivers of globalization and have led to long and complex supply chains. Recent disturbances such as COVID-19 or the Suez Canal obstruction caused severe supply disruptions and thereby unveiled the vulnerability of global trade. Resilient supply chains are characterized by the capacity to absorb, adapt to, and restore after disruptions. Building upon the established concept of the ‘resilience curve’, this article explores the interplay between resilience capacities, metrics, and actions in the state-of-the-art literature. We first analyze and harmonize the terminology used to describe capacities as well as metrics for quantifying resilience. This results in a set of 17 resilience metrics that describe all characteristics of the resilience curve and can be used as a tool to assess the resilience of a supply chain. Subsequently, we propose how these metrics can be applied to quantify the effect of resilience actions. Finally, we analyze which actions are proposed in the literature and classify those actions according to their relation to traditional supply chain planning tasks. Practitioners such as supply chain decision-makers can implement these actions to strengthen the absorptive, adaptive, and restorative capacities and are provided with mathematical formulations to quantify the strengthening effect of actions. Academic research can, inter alia, integrate the metrics into multi-criteria optimization models for decision-making and explore the interplay between economic efficiency, environmental sustainability, and resilience.

Deconstructing the organizational resilience of construction firms in major emergencies: A text mining analysis of listed construction companies in China

The COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in unprecedented huge losses for construction companies in terms of capital, labor, and project construction, highlighting a significant lack of organizational resilience (OR) within the construction industry. How to improve the OR of construction companies has become the key to resolve the crisis. However, there is a lack of systematic insights into the structure and dimensions of OR, as well as a gap in empirical evidence to explain how construction firms systematically construct OR. Therefore, this paper systematically identifies 19 resilience topics and their language descriptions by mining the resilience-related information in 1572 annual reports and expert interview data of listed companies in the Chinese construction industry during the COVID-19 pandemic, using a combination of the topic model and language model. Following the basic concept of OR, a framework of OR dimensions in the construction firms that integrates actions, resources, and capabilities is developed to uncover the complex resilience characteristics of construction firms. The results show that OR sought by listed companies in the construction industry consists of resilient actions, resilience resources, and resilience capabilities. Resilient actions stem from motivating, restraining, protecting, and exploring actions. The resilience resources include the resource reserves of organization, technology, and knowledge, while the resilience capabilities are dynamic capabilities that integrate prevention, response, adaptation, monitoring, perception, and recovery. The findings not only deconstruct the OR framework for construction companies to cope with crises, but also provide new paths for construction managers to cultivate the OR of companies in practice.

Structured Equations to Assess the Socioeconomic and Business Factors Influencing the Financial Sustainability of Traditional Amazonian Chakra in the Ecuadorian Amazon

This study focuses on investigating the dimensions of sustainability and their influence on financial-economic sustainability (FES) in traditional agroforestry systems (TAFS) using the case of the Amazonian Chakra. The main objectives were to analyze the dimensions of sustainability and to establish the causal relationships between these dimensions and the FES. To carry out this research, 330 households in Napo Province that use the Amazonian Chakra system to grow cocoa were selected in order to analyze the relationship between the different dimensions of sustainability and FES in this unique context. The results of the study show that practices related to food security (FS) and business factors (BF) have a positive and significant impact on the FES of cocoa-producing households in the Amazonian Chakra system. These findings support the importance of ensuring the availability and quality of food and promoting responsible business practices in these environments. In contrast, the dimensions of environmental resilience (ER) and biodiversity conservation (BC) showed a negative impact on FES, highlighting an economic-financial imbalance in relation to conservation and environmental resilience actions in the Amazonian Chakra. This study contributes to the knowledge needed to promote agricultural practices that include an equal focus on FES, biodiversity conservation, and environmental resilience practices in a globally significant area, providing valuable information for the design of sustainable agricultural policies and practices in the Amazonian Chakra.

Analysis of Management Practices and Breeders' Perceptions of Climate Change's Impact to Enhance the Resilience of Sheep Production Systems: A Case Study in the Tunisian Semi-Arid Zone.

Global climate change inflicts unambiguous risks on agricultural systems and food security. Small ruminants are known for their ability to adapt to changing environmental conditions. This paper aims to characterize sheep production systems in a vulnerable agricultural zone and the breeders' perceptions of climate change to apprehend challenges that they are confronting, and formulate resilience actions. The data analysis is based on 94 semi-structured surveys of sheep farmers carried out in the Tunisian semi-arid region. The PCA analysis results revealed three main sheep production systems. The agro-pastoral rain-fed system (AGPRF) is dominant (55%), with large farms and common pastures integrating cereals and fodder. The agro-pastoral irrigated system (AGPI: 20%) is characterized by small-area and forage irrigation (1.8 ha) and a smaller number of ewes but a greater use of animal feed supplementation. The agro-sylvo-pastoral system (AGSP: 25%) is a system where grazing is based on common lands and using tree sub-products, while the agricultural area is exclusively used to cultivate cereal crops. Sheep breeders' climate perceptions are summarized as unpredictable climate events, a decrease in precipitation, and an increase in temperature. Resilience actions principally consist of reducing flocks' numbers, using alternative local feed, fodder, and water resources, and building more shelters and planting more trees in the grazing areas. Nevertheless, cost-effectiveness should be considered in such vulnerable zones to insure the sheep production systems' sustainability.

Learning About Resilience from Rural Interprofessional Healthcare Teams: Insights from the “First Wave” of COVID-19

Building resilience is a key concern for adult educators today as we face unprecedented global challenges such as the coronavirus disease-19 (COVID-19). Nowhere is this more apparent than in educational initiatives with health professionals who experience many stressors in their work, now amplified by the pandemic. This paper reports the results of focus groups with three interprofessional primary healthcare teams in rural Nova Scotia, Canada, in the fall of 2021. The aim was to learn about their lived experience during the first year of the pandemic, as a basis for considering how resilience could be nurtured and supported in rural team-based collaborative practices settings. Findings reveal that, while each collaborative team experienced recognized COVID-19 workplace stressors, they leveraged a store of collective resilience to navigate the pandemic. The trust, sense of purpose, and shared problem-solving skills they derived from working in collaborative structures over time enabled them to regain equilibrium and to adapt to new norms, and to transform thier practices. The study highlights the power of collaborative learning to strengthen overall ability for resilient performance, and the adaptive capacity that is required to deliver and sustain quality healthcare. The study highlights the need for continuing professional education that values naturally occurring practice-based learning. Adult educators are well positioned to support health professionals and health systems to nurture and support resilient action. They bring an understanding of effective collaborative tools and processes that foster dialogue and collective awareness that leads to a shared identity and understanding. As this study reveals, it is this shared identity and capacity arising within a group that enables them to draw on their collective sources of support to deal with adversity.

Landscape analysis of healthcare workforce and resilience actions in the Sahelian context of high security challenge areas: The case of Burkina Faso.

Access to health services is a major challenge in developing countries in general, particularly those affected by insecurity. The availability of sufficient quantity and quality of equitably distributed healthcare workforce is a major obstacle, yet it is an essential pillar of an effective and efficient national health system. Burkina Faso, similar to other countries in the Sahel, has been affected by an unprecedented security crisis that has severely tested the functionality of health facilities and the availability of healthcare workforce. To describe the landscape of healthcare workforce and to analyse the actions taken by the government and other stakeholders to improve the resilience of the system and the retention of healthcare workers in the context of major security challenges. This is a transversal, descriptive and analytical study carried out in Burkina Faso in 2023 through a documentary review, analyses of databases collected from health districts and regional directorates, focus groups and a national triangulation workshop with key informants. The study shows that, with the closure and minimal functioning of certain health facilities in security-challenged areas, healthcare workforceare concentrated in the urban areas of regional and district capitals, to the detriment of rural areas. Some staff become in an irregular situation regarding the administration. To strengthen resilience to the crisis, the main solutions have been implemented: (i) enhancing the community platform with the recruitment of 15,000 community-based health volunteers, (ii) delegating tasks to community health agents, (iii) simplified approaches, (iv) advanced health posts and mobile clinics, (v) redeployment to the most stable structures, (vi) thinking about legislation in crisis situations. Community resilience through the delegation of tasks to community-based health workers and strengthening of the community health platform has helped ensure the continuity of care in insecure areas. However, the optimization of innovative and attractive strategies will further improve the retention and return of healthcare workers in rural areas affected.

The impacts of AWS from digital visions to action for supply chain resilience, performances, and inclusiveness

The impacts of AWS from digital visions to action for supply chain resilience, performances, and inclusiveness

A Path Towards Assessing and Increasing Health System Resilience in Non-traditional Flood Areas

Abstract Rapid deforestation, urbanization, and biodiversity loss over the last century has changed landscapes and disorientated the climate. This has magnified temperature, wind speed, air quality, and other meteorological variables. For example, the urban heat island effect has resulted in city areas being hotter than nearby rural areas and expanding physical landscapes combined with shifting precipitation patterns has increased flood risks in new locations. The result has been unexpected disruption to healthcare, supply chains, and changes in vector, water, and foodborne disease patterns. To find solutions to this challenge, a transdisciplinary approach is needed to assess and anticipate the impact of floods and other emerging risks on public health systems. The United Nations Public Health System Resilience Scorecard (Scorecard) could provide the process needed for this to occur. This is a reliable, scalable, and versatile tool that has been applied and tested in multiple communities and countries. Attendees to this session will learn about the Scorecard methodology and how it can be applied in different settings, used to build consensus, and employed to inform future resilience actions. Ultimately, providing a framework for maximizing the resilience of public health systems during a time of rapidly shifting environmental, social, and fiscal climates. Learning Objectives Identify the impact floods and other disasters can have on public health systems in non-traditional at-risk areas. Explore the United Nations Public Health System Resilience Scorecard (Scorecard) and its alignment with the 2030 United Nations agenda. Understand why a transdisciplinary approach is needed to assess the impact of floods and other emerging risks on public health systems. Demonstrate how the Scorecard can be applied in multiple communities and countries to identify, rank, and prioritize resilience actions for public health systems.

Resilience Of Affected Wetland Rice Farmer Households Flooding: An Integrated Model

Natural disasters can hamper development plans in food commodity development. There are many disaster-prone areas that need efforts to reduce the risks that occur from these disasters. The purpose of this study was to analyze the determinants of resilience of households of wet-rice farmers affected by flooding. This research uses a quantitative analysis approach with survey method. The research data were collected through primary and secondary data. The respondent sampling technique used multi-stage cluster random sampling with a total of 306 respondents. The results showed that mitigation, adaptation, coping mechanisms, and risk levels had a significant influence on the resilience model of households of flood-affected wetland rice farmers. Based on these results, this research can be a reference for practitioners in increasing the intention of resilience actions against natural disasters that occur. Furthermore, the need for policies from the government to respond to natural disasters so that they do not have a long impact on the continuity of farming that is managed.

Organizational resilience as a method of crisis governance during the COVID-19 period

The perception of the crisis and derivation of organizational resilience, including the role of human resources, are explored. Phases of resilience are analyzed alongside different levels of resilience action (Granig & Hilgarter, 2020). This paper seeks to understand how organizational resilience affects companies’ ability to deal with the crisis in a real organizational setting through an empirical analysis of 20 COVID-19-affected organizations. The suitable managerial and organisational responses are analysed. The qualitative exploratory approach uses semi-structured interviews to more accurately characterize how resilience mechanisms function in a real organizational context (Gajdzik & Wolniak, 2021). The vital contribution is confirming an advantageous role for resilience to resistance in the face of the COVID-19 issue in a Fijian setting by taking exceptional steps that the enterprises included in this study have never taken. This research examines resilience as a protection strategy against the COVID-19 problem in a Fijian environment. As COVID-19 is an exceptional crisis, this pandemic and the timely results of this paper stand out. In light of this, it is believed one can develop pioneering and ultimate new directions for resilience literature in the future.

Using multi-stakeholder causal mapping to explore priorities for infrastructure resilience to flooding

Urban resilience to natural hazards could make our cities less vulnerable to adverse weather events. However, the implementation of resilience actions is currently not effective, as mechanisms to facilitate collaboration among involved stakeholders are missing. This paper for the first time explores causal mapping as a method to disassemble major issues of urban resilience into a more manageable understanding, and thus identify key objectives, barriers and opportunities in thinking “resilient cities”. In this study, a cognitive-mapping-based workshop was held to elicit information from stakeholders in the remit of urban resilience to flooding. The statements and connections identified during the workshop led a consolidated map, analysed using the StrategyFinder software. This analysis highlighted barriers related to data availability, silo-based approaches and lack of funding; it also evidenced shared goals, such as the need to protect the built environment and minimise impact from flooding. Overall, causal mapping resulted a powerful analytical tool for improving understanding of the complex dynamics of urban resilience, identifying key variables and relationships, as well as eliciting information from stakeholders. Furthermore, this approach facilitated systems thinking, communication and collaboration. This enhanced understanding is fundamental for advancing strategies for future planning, contributing to urban sustainability and liveability.

Retracted: Uncovering Resilient Actions of Robotic Technology with Data Interpretation Trajectories Using Knowledge Representation Procedures

Retracted: Uncovering Resilient Actions of Robotic Technology with Data Interpretation Trajectories Using Knowledge Representation Procedures

Livelihood Resilience of Small Fishers Households in Rural Areas, Indonesia

The concept of livelihood resilience provides a unique framework for examining the utilization of livelihood capital and resilience values of farming households in ensuring sustainable communities. This study was conducted in Muarareja Village, Tegal Barat Subdistrict, Tegal City, in January-March 2019 by assessing the utilization of five livelihood capitals and livelihood resilience actions of fisher households facing social, economic, and ecological pressures. Data were collected through surveys, observations, and structured interviews, supported by a literature review. Purposive stratified-accidental sampling was used to interview fishermen from every socioeconomic class. The sample was 40 small-scale fisher households divided into 35 lower-layer fisher households and five upper-layer fisher households. Data analysis was conducted descriptively with simple tabulation to describe the condition of the study area. The results showed that social capital is the main capital utilized by lower-layer fishermen. Meanwhile, physical and financial capital are mostly utilized by upper-layer fisher households. Genealogical relationships and territorial ties in the study location make social capital dominant. Self-organization is the highest resilience action by lower-layer fisher households by prioritizing the value of trust. Meanwhile, upper-layer fishermen households have a high resilience value in the capacity of learning action on the value of experimentation. Ownership of larger production capital makes it easier for upper-layer fishermen households to make many alternatives to continue fishing. Meanwhile, due to limited ownership and access to production capital, lower-layer fishing households prioritize the value of trust between neighbors and relatives as their social safety net.

Facing Climate Vulnerability in Mountain Areas: The Role of Rural Actors’ Agency and Situated Knowledge Production

Climate change is challenging in mountain areas, and initiatives to define resilience programs appear essential to face global warming impacts. Despite the participatory strategy being primarily considered the best solution to involve local actors in adopting resilience actions, the literature stresses how mountain dwellers, like farmers, are often considered passive subjects, and their ability to understand climate change and the actions to adopt is inadequate. Based on this consideration, we aim to highlight the relevance of the mountain actors’ agency, their “lay” situated knowledge, and the epistemology for co-defining resilience actions. Adopting a “weak version” of the Actor-Network Theory as the research posture, we argue that farmers’ perceptions of climate vulnerability is based on their experience of it, and their resilience actions or suggestions are coherent with their endowment resources (financial and knowledge) and their position in the economic system. In this sense, local actors’ initiatives to face climate change can be limited by their specific position in the socioeconomic contest-related value chain and their specific relationship with local natural settings. A participative strategy to co-define resilience actions can help identify more effective initiatives according to the context between actors. Moreover, it can contribute to the knowledge exchange among “lay” local actors, experts, and policymakers, benefiting everyone; farmers could identify suitable solutions to face climate vulnerability, experts could increase their knowledge of local contexts, and policymakers could define adequate policies. Focusing on a specific area in “Alto Molise” (Italy), we present research results to contribute to the debate on climate resilience in mountain areas, stressing the significance of the local actors’ agency, the presence of the different epistemologies put in play (lay and expert ones), the co-production of knowledge, and the need to actively involve local actors in designing practices and policies to face climate change.