Introduction Hong Kong has been facing a growing number of adversities and challenges for the past few decades. Characterized by high population density, Hong Kong is more susceptible to multiple large-scale natural disasters and health crises ranging from typhoons to fires to infectious diseases invasion. Whenever any of the subsystems of Hong Kong are destroyed or fail to adapt to these new challenges, fatal crisis or even destruction will strike. Urban resilience is the ability that helps Hong Kong adapt and transform in the face of these chronic stresses and acute shocks, assisting the city to prepare both the expected and also the unexpected. Disasters like the recent Ebola outbreak and 2003 SARS outbreaks in Hong Kong are not only the …show more content…
This paper will examine the critical characteristics of urban resilience and propose some actionable initiatives that could be adopted to improve urban resilience to face infectious diseases outbreak in Hong Kong. Literature Review Resilience is a term that emerged from the field of ecology in the 19th century to describe the capability of a system to retain or regain its functionality in disruptive events (Folke, 2006). The term resilience can be applied to a city as cities are complex systems that require consistent adaptation to the constantly changing and uncertain circumstances. Urban resilience describes the ability of an urban area to function and provide essential services so that the …show more content…
All stakeholders are involved to create plans and to ensure that the interests of all social groups are taken into consideration. Coordination between departments and organizations enables the use of existing knowledge and data across the city to better understand current and future vulnerabilities. Urban planning and development ensures a holistic and long-term approach to urban growth, taking potential shocks and stresses into account and encouraging proactive mitigation measures. Multiple strategies are in place to ensure that primary goals can be achieved in the face of different adversities and challenges. In addition, residents of the city, including the vulnerable and the poor, are given fair access to basic service. Supportive structures such as safety net programs target all vulnerable people of the society and deliver their services effectively under any scenario. All residents have sufficient capacity to deal with and bounce back from stresses and shocks. For the disaster risk management system, it combines a well-functioning and inclusive disaster preparedness and emergency response mechanism with effective disaster prevention infrastructure. Such mechanism is based on an integrated citywide risk assessment and is developed to prepare for and recover from expected
The Haitian government’s lack of preparedness for earthquakes despite the fact that earthquakes are common to the region is indicative of the governments inability and lack of resources to properly plan and protect it’s population against natural disasters. This lack of preparedness is not an isolated incident. Prior to the disaster, the World Bank and others were working with the Haitian government to incorporate disaster risk management into Haiti’s development strategy and to develop its capacity for disaster response. This capacity building was in its early stages of development when the earthquake hit, on January 12, 2010, and was mainly focused on hurricanes, which are the most common cause of natural disaster on the island (Margesson, 2010, p. 4).
Both man-made and natural disasters are often devastating, resource draining and disruptive. Having a basic plan ready for these types of disaster events is key to the success of executing and implementing, as well as assessing the aftermath. There are many different ways to create an emergency operations plan (EOP) to encompass a natural and/or man-made disaster, including following the six stage planning process, collection of information, and identification of threats and hazards. The most important aspect of the US emergency management system in preparing for, mitigating, and responding to man-made and natural disasters is the creation, implementation and assessment of a community’s EOP.
After a disaster hits, it takes a long time for the local and state government to regain its basic functions and to draft redevelopment plans (Olshansky et al., 2008). With malfunctioning government, it is hard to start the recovery process promptly and citizens who are in need of immense amount of economic and social support suffer from lack of resources and public services.
Resilience gives people living in poor conditions a way to change the way they perceive situations by creative a view of positivity. Relationships between poverty and the environment in rural destitute neighborhoods are not
We have seen a constant change of our environment afflicted by the human, nature and nurture influence, creating and reinventing what we know of a culture, city and society. San Francisco, a city of multi-diverse neighborhoods of highly trending culture, commerce, fashion and finance, has been immensely affected by it; seeing a consistent development before and after the 1906 earthquake which destroyed over 80% of San Francisco. The earthquake and the subsequent fires, one of the worst natural disasters in the history of the United States, took from the people of the Bay Area their houses and families, leaving roughly 3000 deaths and at least 270,000 people homeless. Nonetheless, this mayor disaster also gave the opportunity for a rebuild
Cutters model of resilience is a model that use five components in measuring resilience. There are social resilience, economic resilience, institutional resilience, infrastructure and community capital. Compare to the PEOPLE model and Torrens model, Cutters model has moderate consideration. It is more complex than Torrens model but less comprehensive than PEOPLE model.
The city has been evolving for the better since the times of widespread disease and famine that once hit “urbanized cities” during the industrial revolution. During the 1800’s diseases like typhoid, cholera and tuberculosis impacted people in a way where it was expected
The Oxford dictionary defines the word resilience as “the capacity to recover quickly from difficulties” (Oxford Dictionaries | English, 2017). In simpler words the term resilience is the ability to bounce back from tough situations. This straight forward definition of resilience is only one of many ways in which people define resilience. Psychology Today simply states that people who are resilient do not dwell on negative things that happen to them or in their lives, and rather get on with things, “Resilience
Resiliency is the ability to successfully overcome adversity (Seccombe, 2016). Learning resilience is a lifelong process. Elements at the macro and micro level produce the harsh conditions or recovery mechanisms (Seccombe, 2016). Macro-level elements include political and social systems. Micro-level elements consist of the family system and an individual’s characteristics. Additionally, it is these environmental factors and individual characteristics that foster either resignation or resilience (Seccombe, 2016). The book Louisa (Emmel, 2007), illustrates how a culture’s social policy was restrictive while the family structure and individual characteristics were the protective/recovery means that provided resilience.
“Resilience is defined as an attitude that enables the individual to examine, enhance and utilize the strengths, characteristics and other resources available to him or her”. (Harrington, 2012) By learning how to manage resilience in the key elements of your life such as your emotions, spiritual and social relationships, along with how to deal family situations and placing a positive spin on obstacles that arise will help reduce stress. I find that I use resilience when a trying to organize a group of people with many moving parts and they are creating their own agenda, this is when I use the emotion element relating to resilience. It is important that I can work through stressful situations and manage my emotions within my personal life as well as in
Resilience is important because it is the human capacity to face, overcome and be strengthened by or even transformed by
A general situation of urbanization trend in developing countries and developed countries is increasing. In 18th Century only 3% of the world total population lived in urban areas but as projected in 2000 this number will increase at above 50% (UN as cited in Elliot, 1999, p. 144). According to UN (as cited in Elliot, 1999, p.144), it is figured that the total urban population in developing countries has increased from approximately 400 millions people in 1950 to approximately 2000 millions people in 2000. At the same time, total urban population in developed countries is double...
In 1950, only 13% of China’s population lived in cities (Seto, n.d.). Post 30 years, one hundred-million people moved to large cities from rural areas in China. This migration was considered the largest migration in human history. To compare this migration to western cities, the example of Shenzhen is used. For a Western city to have a population of three million to increase to ten million, it takes about a hundred years. 30-year old city, Shenzhen on the other hand made this population increase in just a decade (qtd. Caughey and Dawn). Today, over 53.7% of its population lives in cities; by 2020 it is projected that a whole 60% of the population will live in cities (Xinhuanet, 2014).
Steward T.A. Pickett, Brian McGrath, M.L. Cadenasso & Alexander J. Felson. “Ecological Resilience and Resilient Cities.” Building Research & Information, 42:2 (2014), 143-157
Establishing resilient communities is vital to maintaining a geographic location’s quality and standard of living. Alexander (2013) defines resilience as a positive reaction or adaptation (p. 2710). The integration of social resilience, economic resilience, institutional resilience, infrastructural resilience, and community capital while understanding how current governance practices influence the extent of their achievability, is essential to creating resilient communities.