Resilience and recovery

In the early 2000s I became interested in the Lifelines community – these were voluntary groups which sought to build resilient infrastructure so that in the event of a (natural) disaster there would not be what is termed “cascading failure” in which one service failed, leading to another failing and so on.  Top of the list for resilience were normally communications and electricity, followed by water, then sanitation, followed by fuel and food supply. One of the most active such groups was in Christchurch, and their work made a huge difference in 2011.

Even though the physical infrastructure is not broken, we have seen, and are seeing, cascade failures of a different kind in the present disaster.  Our greatest defence this time is human ingenuity to change ways of doing things, aided enormously by scientific evidence and the huge investment in communications infrastructure.

As is the case following natural disasters, we find that in the recovery phase we will need much more than science and technology to guide us – social sciences and the humanities also have significant roles, as there will inevitably be changes to previous societal norms – be those in human rights and law, in helping people adjust to changed circumstances, redistribution of wealth and new vulnerable groups.  At such times, we realise again that the really 'wicked' issues facing humanity are complex, multi-dimensional and trans-disciplinary, and at such times we in the Society can be glad that unlike similar bodies in many other countries, we embrace all disciplines.

I am delighted with how well the Society staff have been able to maintain most of our normal operations in a work from home mode. We put back some deadlines to better support applicants rather than needing to do so for internal reasons. As we progressively return to office over the next couple of weeks (assuming this nation’s successful track to elimination continues) we hope to pick up those things we could not do so well for the last couple of months.  If any member has suggestions for how we can better support you, or wishes to advise anything that might have slipped please feel free to contact myself or our membership team.