Exploring the role of social capital in advancing climate change mitigation and disaster risk reduction

ABSTRACT

This work explores how social capital impacts community resilience via the community development framework, with dimensions spanning trust, cooperativism, volunteerism, reciprocity, and interpersonal relationships in mitigating climate change impacts. With flooding impacts as a case, a mixed method approach was used, purposely recruiting 24 research cooperators in one of the suburban villages in the central Philippines. Results show that key components in disaster mitigation plans include help-seeking behavior, community responses, social relations, and resource allocation within communities. Findings demonstrate that social capital has proven invaluable in mobilizing resources, building resilience, disseminating information, mediating conflict resolution, providing psychological support, and improving livelihoods within communities. By exploring the role of social capital in community development, this study sheds light on its importance for climate change mitigation and disaster risk reduction initiatives. Policymakers, development practitioners, and community leaders can frame these findings to effectively harness social capital and foster community participation.

KEYWORDS:

• Community resiliency
• participation
• social capital
• climate change mitigation
• disaster risk reducation

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. Purok is comprised of kin-based relations and some close acquaintances of approximately 20–50 households, with defined boundaries, headed by a volunteer deliberately chosen by its members (Borchgrevink, 2002). “The significance of clearly defined boundaries is that every resident is linked to a community of citizens that pave the way for or optimizes cooperation or participation in numerous self-help voluntary programs for which Filipinos are well-known” (Austin, 1994 p.358). Thus, every individual or household is a member of a purok and is associated with the purok.