Resilience and Transformation: Preparing Australia for Uncertain Futures

By CSIRO PUBLISHING

Resilience and Transformation explores what factors contribute to Australia’s resilience, what trends are apparent, and what actions are required to better prepare us for the immediate and longer term future.

Resilience is a word used more and more across societies worldwide as decision makers realise that predicting and controlling the future does not work and that preparing for uncertainty and surprise is vital. Many viewpoints have emerged on how to assess and achieve resilience of individuals, organisations, communities and ecosystems, but rarely has the resilience of a nation been considered. As Australia moves into a millennium that promises major economic, social, technological and environmental change, Australia21 has assembled some of Australia’s leading thinkers to give their perspectives on the extent and direction of resilience across our nation’s social, economic, ecological and disaster management systems.

• Language: English
• Publisher: CSIRO PUBLISHING
• Release date: Aug 13, 2010
• ISBN: 9780643102149

Book preview

OVERVIEW

CHAPTER 1

Introduction and synthesis of key themes

Steven Cork

‘Resilience’ is a word on many lips at the moment. It is used in disciplines as diverse as engineering, medicine, ecology, economics, education, defence, business and law. The risk management profession, for example, is currently emphasising organisational resilience as a key component of preparing for future challenges and opportunities. Where ‘sustainability’ was a prime focus for policy relating to interactions between the environment, society and economies for many years, the concept of resilience is being introduced as a way to ensure that ecological and social systems are able to find their way towards sustainability (whatever societies decide that is, in the future) in the face of potential shocks, some of which can be partly anticipated and some of which will come as surprises. Various chapters in this book comment on the appearance and interpretation of ‘resilience’ in policies and strategies for the environment, health, welfare, national security, law, education and business, among other areas.

The popularity of this term comes in part from the recognition that attempts to predict and control the future have been largely unsuccessful, in whatever field of human endeavour they have been attempted. There is comfort to many in the idea that they can do something tangible about preparing for the future by building the capacity of people, societies and ecosystems to deal with whatever emerges. This comfortable feeling, however, has led to uncritical application of the term in many fields. In the business literature, for example, it is easy to find lists of actions to take to improve organisational resilience but it is difficult to find empirical or theoretical underpinnings for this advice. Rita Parker (Chapter 4, this volume) explains how it is possible for an organisation to ‘tick the resilience boxes’ but still not be resilient because it does not understand the intangible aspects of the concept. Similarly, Cork (Chapter 15) points out that although all major environmental strategies developed by Australian governments make resilience a key component of the problem definition and the proposed solutions, few are either explicit about what it means in terms of governance and management or fully apply resilience thinking in implementation plans.

The broad application of the concept of resilience has, however, been questioned by some critics. Some point to a perceived lack of theory associated with the concept or the impression that the concept is being offered as the solution to all of society’s problems. Others question how it is different from other concepts (e.g. ‘capacity building’ or ‘adaptability’) that have come before it. Advocates of the concept point out that resilience should not be considered a panacea, and that a body of theory is emerging that explicitly addresses how resilience thinking relates to other ways of dealing with current and future challenges and itself questions many of the ill-informed applications of the concept.

Research brought together under the umbrella of the Resilience Alliance (Resilience Alliance 2009; Walker and Salt 2006) has revealed a number of principles about resilience that provide a strong basis for dialogue about what resilience might mean in different situations. These principles reveal that some ‘common sense’ interpretations of resilience are ultimately unhelpful because they lead to logical inconsistencies. A perfect example is the idea that resilience is about resisting change. Research on how social and ecological systems have responded to change in the past shows that resisting change is a recipe for a system to be overwhelmed by it and to lose its essential functions and identity. Thus, most recent definitions of resilience have been couched in terms of systems responding to perturbations by changing, within limits, while retaining their essential functions, structures and ‘identity’. These and other principles are discussed in some detail in Chapters 15 and 17.

But Australia21 recognises that being prescriptive about any theory or practice will not bring about desirable change. Resilience thinking advocates diversity of ideas. People with different backgrounds, skills, experiences and world views will want to come to grips with the concept of resilience in their own ways. Thus, in preparing this volume we invited authors to define and interpret resilience from their own perspective. We asked them to consider what factors confer resilience within the systems they study and what trends they think are emerging or underway with respect to the resilience of these systems. Many common messages have emerged, which are discussed in the following chapter on key themes and policy implications.

With the rapid expansion of interest in resilience across all sectors of Australian society and internationally, it is understandable that people involved in different initiatives are often unaware of one another’s activities. Diversity of approach is to be encouraged but lack of communication is a problem to be addressed. This volume and the previous initiatives by Australia21 to bring people interested in analysing resilience together (Cork et al. 2007, 2008; Cork 2009) are attempts to improve the sharing of knowledge about the issues surrounding this concept through open dialogue. We hope this volume will encourage further dialogue about how well Australia and Australians are preparing for the next few decades and beyond.

References

Cork S (2009) ‘Brighter prospects: Enhancing the resilience of Australia’. Australia21, Canberra, <www.australia21.org.au/pdf/A21%20Brighter%20Prospects%20Report.pdf>.

Cork S, Eckersley R and Walker B (2007) ‘Rapid and surprising change in Australia’s future – Anticipating and preparing for future challenges and opportunities on the way to a sustainable Australia’. Australia21, Canberra, <http://www.australia21.org.au/pdf/Tipping2007.pdf>.

Cork S, Walker B and Buckley R (2008) ‘How resilient is Australia?’. Australia21, Canberra, <http://www.australia21.org.au/pdf/Resilient08.pdf>.

Resilience Alliance (2009) Research on Resilience in Social–Ecological Systems – A Basis for Sustainability. Resilience Alliance, Stockholm, <http://www.resalliance.org>.

Walker B and Salt D (2006) Resilience Thinking: Sustaining Ecosystems and People in a Changing World. Island Press, Washington, DC.

CHAPTER 2

Policy implications

Steven Cork

Abstract

This chapter summarises and synthesises the thinking from the rest of this volume. A detailed summary of advice and recommendations is presented, followed by a shortlist of overarching recommendations and some discussion of these. This shortlist includes:

learn from the substantial information on resilience that now exists

apply governance processes that promote rather than inhibit resilience

identify what is resilient to what pressures

recognise that resilience is about more than good risk assessment

recognise that resilience can be not only desirable but also undesirable

address declining reserves.

consider ‘systems’ at scales above and below the one currently under scrutiny

develop a new approach to national security, prosperity and well-being

develop nation-building response plans to address interrelated challenges

take steps to achieve energy and water use efficiency, carbon-neutrality, eco-efficiency, green productivity, especially with respect to Australia’s cities, and satisfaction of human cultural and other social needs

Policy makers are increasingly focusing on resilience

Thinking about resilience has proceeded apace in business circles and academia over the past 5–10 years. This has included advice to policy makers about issues as diverse as environmental, organisational, governance, health and economic resilience, to which Australia21 has made several contributions (Cork et al. 2007, 2008; Cork 2009). It is impossible in the space available here to review the many ways in which the concept of resilience is finding its way into policy forums. The following examples give a flavour.

Australian policy makers have begun to focus on the challenging question of how resilience thinking can be applied not only in policies but also to the policy development process itself. For example, most major policies for environmental management in Australia include social and ecological resilience as key objectives (see Chapter 15, this volume). Similarly, the Council of Australian Governments has endorsed resilience measures in early childhood development and the health sector and recently agreed to a ‘new whole-of-nation, resilience based approach to natural disaster policy and programs, which recognises that a disaster resilient community is one that works together to understand and manage the risks that it confronts’. This agreement has led to a ‘National Disaster Resilience Statement’ (Council of Australian Governments 2009).

The Attorney General of Australia recently announced the renaming and refocussing of its ‘Critical Infrastructure Protection’ program to ‘Critical Infrastructure Resilience’ (my emphasis) with a focus on organisational and disaster resilience. A ‘Resilience Community of Interest’ has been established between businesses and Commonwealth, State and Territory Government agencies with the objective of ‘promoting the concept of organisational resilience within the business community generally, and critical infrastructure in particular, for the purposes of building a more resilient nation’ (TISN 2009). This community of interest worked with members of the business and risk management communities to run a ‘National Organisational Resilience Framework Workshop’ (TISN 2007). The Risk Management Institute of Australia’s (RMIA) recent national conference focused on ‘The Road to Resilience’ (RMIA 2009). The ‘Torrens Resilience Institute’ was recently established in Adelaide (Torrens Resilience Institute 2009). Numerous organisations focus on resilience in New Zealand, including ‘Resilient Organisations’, which brings together ‘engineering disciplines and business leadership aimed at transforming NZ organisations into those that both survive major events and thrive in the aftermath’ (Resilient Organisations 2009).

Internationally, resilience is prominent in research and policy forums at a range of scales from global to local (e.g. Millennium Ecosystem Assessment 2009; Resilience Alliance 2009) and in government and business debates (e.g. Cabinet Office UK 2009; Cascio 2009; International Resilience Project 2009; Skandinaviska Enskilda Banken 2009).

Summary of advice and recommendations from individual chapters

As with all debates about policy, there is an inevitable gap between what people outside government think policy makers should do about resilience and what government policy makers think is feasible and attractive. Table 2.1 summarises the advice offered by the authors of the chapters in this book. Some of that advice is directed at government and some at industry and broader society. Most of the authors have considerable experience working in, or with, government policy agencies. Nevertheless, we do not pretend that the advice is definitive; it is a starting point for ongoing dialogue with professional policy makers about how to address the substantial challenges and opportunities that resilience thinking presents.

Table 2.1 Summary of advice and recommendations for the chapters of this volume