Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
and incorporate tourism, fishing other extractive uses and transport. It is often
argued that coastal ecosystems themselves are either more resilient or more
stable, and therefore coastal communities are more resilient. But the economy
is still reliant on a single coastal system. If an oil spill affects a tourism beach
then it will also affect fishing stocks and have other ecological impacts. In the
Straits of Malacca in peninsular Malaysia, has shown that those parts of a
coastal community directly and entirely dependent on fishing can experience
major impacts from such extraordinary events as oil spills. If the pollution
stress is frequent and severe the fishing communities have to cope with events
which become ‗normal' in their livelihood system. Both the speed of recovery
and the buffer capacity of coastal seas following severe oil spills continually
confound ecologists. The resilience of coastal communities to hazard may
therefore be enhanced by the regenerating and absorptive capacity of the
coastal ecosystems themselves. Market variability is a key issue in the context
of communities dependent on mineral resources. But many resource-
dependent communities in both agricultural and coastal areas, particularly in
the developing world, are partially buffered from such market variability by
their persistent subsistence activities. The resilience of such communities can
therefore be affected in both positive and negative ways by market integration.
There were attempts to demonstrate systematically the importance of market
integration, of the ‗modern agricultural economy', in affecting the
vulnerability of both the physical ecosystems and society in the New Guinea
Highlands. It was found that vulnerability is socially differentiated. On the one
hand market integration has provided some groups with the opportunity for
diversification of crops and hence has contributed to drought-proofing their
livelihoods. By contrast participants in rural settlement schemes are
more
vulnerable to food insecurity due to their reliance on cash crops, many of
which are ecologically inappropriate and hence doubly insecure.
In summary the direct dependence of communities on ecosystems is an
influence on their social resilience and ability to cope with shocks, particularly
in the context of food security and coping with hazards. Resilience can be
undermined by high variability (or disturbance in ecological terms) in the
market system or environmental system. Resilience therefore depends on the
diversity of the ecosystem as well as the institutional rules which govern the
social systems.
Given this complex relationship between social resilience and dependency
on natural resources, a set of key parameters for observing social resilience
can be developed. Social resilience is institutionally determined, in the sense
that institutions permeate all social systems and institutions fundamentally
