Resilience for Whom? Emerging Critical Geographies of Socio‐ecological Resilience

Abstract

Resilience has fast become a popular catchphrase used by government, international finance organisations, NGOs, community groups and activists all over the globe. Despite its widespread use, there remains confusion over what resilience is and the purpose it serves. Resilience can, in some cases, speak to a desire to successfully respond and adapt to disruptions outside of the status quo. However, this conceptualisation of resilience is far from uncontested. Emerging research has shown a lack of consideration for power, agency and inequality in popular and academic use of these frameworks. Criticism has also been raised regarding the use of resilience to justify projects informed by neoliberal ideologies that aim to decrease state involvement, increase community self‐reliance and restructure social services. Despite this, resilience is being used by community and activist groups that aim to address local and global environmental and social issues. With this critical insight, the need has arisen to question what is being maintained, for whom and by whom, through these discourses of resilience. In this review, I trace the evolution of the concept in the literature. Building on this, I discuss three interpretations of the resilience paradigm in current academic, political and activist arenas. I conclude by discussing possible future directions for critical geographic perspectives of resilience.