ABSTRACT
While many urban disaster related efforts coalesce around the concept of resilience in terms of pre-disaster mitigation and preparedness actions, much less attention is given to how resilience is built in post-disaster recovery operations. Using recent research undertaken by the author into urban humanitarian response, this chapter identifies three areas of post-disaster recovery that contribute to long-term resilience-building. They are: engaging in the complexity of the city (using both systems thinking and people-based approaches); strengthening collaboration between actors, in particular local groups, to ensure ‘local ownership’; and, communicating with affected communities, in particular ‘listening better’ through the use of appropriate assessment approaches, to ensure that recovery actions are appropriate. The chapter argues that addressing the meeting of immediate needs and contributing to longer-term resilience are both achievable, and that this is essential if urban humanitarian response is to be effective.
