The Socio-Cultural Aspect of Urban Resilience

RESILIENCE vs. RESISTANCE – a significant difference

Urban resilience is a complex topic and a rich field of research that has been developing for many years both in the academic as well as the public and private spheres of urban planning and management. Yet, outside the ranks of urban practitioners, this concept is often misunderstood and requires clarification.

Clarifying its meaning and distinguishing it from the concept of resistance is necessary to explain its direct implications in city management, especially when it is translated into different European languages. This will help to avoid misunderstandings in the decision-making process, particularly when actions are planned and before funds are spent by local governments. 

Examples of urban good practices that strengthen urban resilience can help to better understand the term. At the end of this article, the author will present several cases of urban good practices, labelled as such under the URBACT Programme.

Resilience – a simple explanation

Resilience can easily be illustrated through a poem by the French writer Jean de La Fontaine. He wrote a poem titled “The Oak and the Reed”, based on an ancient Greek fable by Aesop. The final verses of this poem read as follows:

(…)
From the edge of the horizon furiously comes to them
The most terrible of the progeny
Which the North has till then contained within it.
The tree holds up well; the reed bends.
The wind doubles its trying;
And does so well that it uproots
That, the head of which was neighbor to the sky,
And the feet of which touched the empire of the dead. 
The Oak and the Reed, By Jean de La Fontaine

This poem clearly illustrates the difference between resistance and resilience.

The oak tree resists the force of the wind until it eventually falls. In contrast to it, the reed is resilient because it is able to regain its balance after the storm.

An example of this difference in the context of infrastructure would be the flood embankments along rivers that flow through cities. These structures are designed to resist floods by containing water whenever its level rises. It is however possible, as many examples in recent years in Spain and Poland have shown, that flood waters can sometimes be so strong that they eventually breach the flood embankments, causing major damages in urban areas.

In contrast to that, solutions such as floodplains or sponge cities with rain gardens — designed to absorb excess water — contribute to strengthening urban resilience.

In the case of a flood, some parts of the city may suffer from it, but the city itself is prepared to absorb the damage and recover quickly.

Definition of Urban Resilience in urban science and practice:

URBAN RESILIENCE is the ability of cities and larger urban systems to cope with rapid changes. It describes not only the resistance of city structures and infrastructure to disruptive events or phenomena but also the ability to regenerate after such occurrences through the implementation of innovative solutions.

Cities face diverse critical challenges

Urban areas in Europe face multiple challenges of many possible sorts. Each type of challenge results in different kinds of potentially detrimental outcomes for the functioning of the city. The main examples of these challenges include:

Depopulation – increasingly costly infrastructure maintenance, loss of income tax base, decreasing ability to provide services and meet residents’ needs.

Climate change – drought in cities and surrounding areas, heat islands, biodiversity loss.

Energy transition – high costs of transition for both cities and inhabitants. This touches on three main areas: heating/cooling and mobility.

Digital transformation – high costs of transformation, the development of AI, and its consequences for the public sector.

Political agenda and administrative restrictions – short timeframes for delivering political goals, possible changes of perspectives after each election, silo-oriented policymaking.

External, unforeseen threats: pandemic, wars, economic conflicts, economic crises, other.

This is not an exhaustive list of challenges, and each of them would require a more detailed definition to explain the specific threats it poses to the functioning of a city. However, it is even more important to understand the possible overlap among these challenges, their mutual interactions, and the consequences of it on the capacity to react to disruptive events. 

Even if a single one of the above listed challenges may not, on its own, disrupt urban systems, the combination of several could pose a serious threat. The past few years have also shown that some major challenges have occurred rather unexpectedly, taking cities and their administrations by surprise.

Research areas of Urban Resilience

Urban resilience, as a research field, has been developing for many years in several research centres and organisations, such as the Stockholm Resilience Centre.

The following issues are being investigated:

• Regime change – quick reorganisation of urban systems
• Scale and panarchy – the different scales at which urban systems operate influence one another. A significant change at a small scale might induce change at a larger scale.
• Ecosystem services – water, light/heat, air, food production. All of these are of crucial importance for urban systems. Often taken for granted and considered cost-free, (…)
• Analysis of socio-ecological systems – the interaction between natural areas and artificial structures that overlay them.

There are also well-developed tools to assess the resilience of a city or a part of it.

Two examples of such tools for assessing resilient cities include:

• ISO Standard for Resilient Cities Indicators: Opportunities for City and Expert Input. UNISDR United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction. Link: ISO Standard for Resilient Cities Indicator
• City Resilience Index by ARUP and the Rockefeller Foundation. Link:  https://www.arup.com/insights/city-resilience-framework/

The city as a system 

The city can be considered as a system that relies on sectoral administrative structures, with specific tasks assigned to them. These structures generally function on a silo model, meaning that they are focused on completing very concrete tasks within specific time frames. Although this model is effective in delivering simple goals, it is not effective when it comes to intersectoral communication and cooperation. This often leads to some ineffectiveness, inefficiency and many times inefficacy in dealing with major challenges such as the ones listed above.

In contrast to that, there are initiatives and projects that require cooperation across different sectors, geographical areas, or levels of governance. Such initiatives operate across structures, ensuring the flow of information, decisions, etc.

The URBACT Programme is an example of a European initiative that fosters this kind of multilevel and multisectoral cooperation. The integrated approach proposed by the programme projects, known as networks, is specifically designed to cut through these different types of barriers in order to solve the challenges faced bycities through innovative solutions and models of cooperation.

URBACT networks in Europe

The URBACT Programme has been operating since 2002 as the European Territorial Cooperation Program co-financed by the European Regional Development Fund. Its objective is to promote the integrated development of urban areas across Europe.

Cities and city-related entities can apply to its calls. These city-related entities are local agencies defined as public or semi-public organisations estsblished by a city, partially or fully owned by the city authority, and responsible for the design and implementation of specific policies.

In addition to regular calls for projects, the URBACT Programme also organises specific calls for urban Good Practices. These so-called URBACT Good Practices are examples of initiatives led by cities, city institutions, or groups of activists that exemplify how cross-sectoral cooperation and thinking and acting outside of the box can lead to spectacular results that strengthen or increase urban resilience.

In 2024, a set of 112 Good Practices was selected from all over Europe.

A short list of those related to culture in cities can be found at the following link: URBACT Good Practices

Some examples:

• Community Festival of Open Houses: A community festival mobilising citizens, fostering civilian power and urban stewardship through raising awareness towards the values of built heritage to help reduce social isolation.
• Arts District: The conversion of a decaying central area into an innovative cultural district.
• Culture as the intermediary: By using empty buildings and culture as an intermediary, solutions to complex challenges are co-created between citizens and the municipality.
• Arts and culture driving climate activism: Demonstrating how people can act for the climate in ways they might not have imagined.
• Music for social change in Brno: Shaping inclusive public education through performative arts.