Abstrakt
Resilience has become a policy and practical framework to address a range of threats from natural disasters and extreme weather events to political conflicts and terrorism. Focusing on the context of cities, this paper offers a conceptualization of urban resilience, critically interrogating its use for urban governance and its political implications on individual agency.
Additionally, it aims to make a contribution to the existing critical literature on urban resilience. The second part focuses on the Rockefeller Foundation's 100 Resilient Cities program as implemented in the Metropolitan Region of Santiago, Chile.
Empirical data obtained through fieldwork and interviews with representatives of the public sector and civil society suggest that while creating an illusion of inclusiveness and empowerment, the "resilience approach" has largely ignored the structural conditions of extreme social and spatial inequality in Santiago. Local political realities and private sector interests play an important part in this equation.
The case study points to a general tendency of treating city resilience as a technical question, and thereby playing down its deeply political nature. It highlights the disconnection between topography of risk on the one side, and technological interventions on the other.