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Videos, UC QuakeStudies

A video of a presentation by Richard Conlin during the Community Resilience Stream of the 2016 People in Disasters Conference. The presentation is titled, "Resilience, Poverty, and Seismic Culture".The abstract for this presentation reads as follows: A strategy of resilience is built around the recognition that effective emergency response requires community involvement and mobilization. It further recognizes that many of the characteristics that equip communities to respond most effectively to short term emergencies are also characteristics that build strong communities over the long term. Building resilient communities means integrating our approaches to poverty, community engagement, economic development, and housing into a coherent strategy that empowers community members to engage with each other and with other communities. In this way, resilience becomes a complementary concept to sustainability. This requires an asset-based change strategy where external agencies meet communities where they are, in their own space, and use collective impact approaches to work in partnership. This also requires understanding and assessing poverty, including physical, financial, and social capital in their myriad manifestations. Poverty is not exclusively a matter of class. It is a complex subject, and different communities manifest multiple versions of poverty, which must be respected and understood through the asset-based lens. Resilience is a quality of a community and a system, and develops over time as a result of careful analysis of strengths and vulnerabilities and taking actions to increase competencies and reduce risk situations. Resilience requires maintenance and must be developed in a way that includes practicing continuous improvement and adaptation. The characteristics of a resilient community include both physical qualities and 'soft infrastructure', such as community knowledge, resourcefulness, and overall health. This presentation reviews the experience of some earlier disasters, outlines a working model of how emergency response, resilience, and poverty interact and can be addressed in concert, and concludes with a summary of what the 2010 Chilean earthquake tells us about how a 'seismic culture' can function effectively in communities even when government suffers from unexpected shortcomings.

Images, UC QuakeStudies

A photograph of conference leaders and presenters at the second annual Out of the Heart Pacific Women's Leadership Conference, held at Riccarton Racecourse on 21 May 2016. People in the photograph include Terisa Tagicakibau (Community and Public Health; third from left), Losana Korovulavula (Healthy Families New Zealand; middle) and Diane Fenika (Ministry of Pacific Peoples; second from right). The conference was sponsored by All Right? and featured posters from the All Right? I am ... Identity project.

Images, UC QuakeStudies

People stand beside the cordon fence on the Worcester Street bridge. The photographer comments, "This was some of the many people waiting for the White Lights of Hope to be turned on, but when they were we hardly noticed. Sadly it was a big disappointment".