Resileince Social Sciences

This study explores the formulation of vicarious resilience as a useful concept in the middle school age school educational arena. It addresses the question of how teachers who work with learners who experienced dislocation and adversity are affected by the children’s stories of resilience. It focuses on the teachers’ interpretations of their learners’ stories, and how they make sense of the impact these stories have had on their lives. In semi-structured interviews, 21 teachers who work in Accelerated Learning programs in Cali, Colombia were interviewed about their perceptions of their learners’ overcoming of adversity. Data was analyses through the Consensual Qualitative Research methodology (CQR) to describe the themes that speak about the effects of witnessing how learners coped constructively with adversity. These themes are discussed to advance the concept of vicarious resilience and how it can contribute to sustaining and empowering teachers dealing with challenging children and trauma.

The Hindu Kush Himalayan (HKH) region is highly vulnerable to earthquakes and water-induced disasters. This fragile mountain region is under tremendous stress from climate change and land-use degradation that has accelerated flash floods, river-line floods, erosion, and wet mass movements during the monsoon period and drought in the non-monsoon period. Against the backdrop of intensifying disasters and in the absence of a focused documentation of disaster risk reduction issues in the HKH region, this volume presents a comprehensive body of knowledge. The main purpose and objective of this publication is to connect existing data, research, conceptual work, and practical cases on risk, resilience, and risk reduction from the HKH region under a common analytical umbrella. The result is a contribution to advancing disaster resilience and risk reduction in the HKH region. The book will be of special interest to policy makers, donors, and researchers concerned with the disaster issues in the region.

We argue that purely deficit-based perspectives regarding urban social-ecological systems (SES) and the human populations within them represent barriers to these systems' ability to move from undesirable system states into more desirable, sustainable ones. We characterize issues such as individual ecological identity, human exemptionalism, anthropocentrism, and resource dependence. We examine notions found in the resource dependency literature, where we trace the roots of ideas about dependency. We use this literature as a spring board into the possibilities of an antipodal notion of resource dependency potentially applicable in urban contexts, what we call positive dependency. Next we describe two possible sources of positive dependency in urban SES, urgent biophilia and restorative topophilia, followed by a brief discussion applying positive dependence to urban systems challenges and management. We conclude with the importance of recognition of positive dependency as a precursor to the development of a heightened sense of ecological self and sense of ecological place in urban SES, and provide insights and suggestions for further research into civic ecology practices that may enhance positive dependency on and investment in ecological assets that contribute to positive ecological senses of self and place, and the importance of these to achieving sustainable, resilient urban futures.► Deficit-based perspectives on urban systems are barriers to movement from undesirable to more sustainable states. ► Issues such as ecological identity, human exemptionalism, anthropocentrism, and resource dependence contribute to barriers. ► Urgent biophilia and restorative topophilia may enhance ecological identity and beneficial positive dependency. ► Positive dependency may start, re-start, or expand virtuous cycles that confer desired resilience.

Organizational functioning depends on the behaviour and attitude of people within a given society; organizational behaviour is extremely influenced by the socio-cultural environment within which the organization operates. The construction industry in North Cyprus is a very young industry and application of advanced project management methods and adaptation to the changing environment is a challenging process for this sector. The trauma caused by the political conflict on the island is presented as a serious challenge for this industry. The future of North Cyprus's construction industry is embedded in its past, this has given it certain social, political and historical characteristics. The ongoing political unrest in North Cyprus escalates and diminishes at certain intervals. These fluctuations can sometimes be absorbed by the industry, however the frequency is such that the industry struggles to adapt and sometimes even to absorb the shocks. This paper analyses the socio-political environment of North Cyprus's construction industry. Although the organization of SMEs in the construction sector in North Cyprus are very simple, the interrelationships between the companies, the fragmentation of the industry and the participation of families in the businesses make this a socially complex system. In this environment, the decision making processes of the managers are not based on structured management disciplines but on abrupt decisions that emphasize the family interest of the owner manager under severe uncertainties. Therefore, the unpredictable environment within this sector creates a complex environment to manage regardless of the industry's size.