Dr Peter Rogers

'Climate Futures' Co-Director, Department of Sociology, Macquarie University,

Larry Saha Room, Haydon Allen Building #2175

Resilience is now a central policy metaphor in dealing with danger. Resilient ways of thinking, doing and acting are increasingly at the heart of attempts to bring order to the impact from hazards, crises, disasters and catastrophes, both real and imagined. This paper offers an in depth interrogation of the term from its etymological roots to its contemporary uses in research, and offers a genealogical appraisal of how these roots have been carried forward to re-emerge as a hot policy metaphor with a wide influence. Some of the links between resilience, civil contingencies, disaster management, adaptation and disorder are unpacked through research in the UK and in Australia. The wider research agenda of which this paper is a part offers a rethinking of the concept and outlines the implications of both positive and negative outcomes from 'becoming more resilient' for 'societal security'.
 

Speaker Biography:
Dr Peter Rogers, is the Co-Director of 'Climate Futures' and a member of the Societal Security Initiative at Macquarie University. He is an active member of numerous research networks investigating emergency management, risk and security internationally. His current research explores policy development in resilience, and the implementation of emergency management policy in the security sector. He has published on many aspects of resilience and has a new book forthcoming in November 2012 entitled, Resilience and the City: Change (Dis)Order and Disasters (Ashgate).