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Abstract
The global diffusion and reification of resilience – as the innate acceptance of vulnerability and suffering – has become an increasingly common feature in global development and humanitarian discourses. The advocacy of Disaster Risk Reduction represents a central technique of this global ontology of resilience that aims to influence the individual, the society and the state. This article explores how this global worldview of resilience is received by local rationalities of resilience in the Caribbean. This is achieved by examining Caribbean art as a re-presentational form of identity that shapes distinct ontological understandings of insecurity and vulnerability, which subsequently affects the possibilities of subjectivisation which lead towards local creative resistance or a global consent of suffering.
Notes
1. Ontology is understood here as the ’variety of meanings (ways) in which things can be said to be, exist’ (Angeles 1992, cited in Henke, Citation1997, p. 40). See Holger Henke for a deeper and enlightening discussion on Caribbean ontology (Citation1997).
2. As an indicator of rising international support, annual global investment in disaster prevention and preparedness rose from 5.30 million USD in 1995 to 1.11 billion in 2012 (AidData, Citation2015).
3. The argument that there is no such thing as a ‘natural’ disaster has been an ongoing theme in disaster literature since the 1970s (see Hewitt, Citation1983; Lewis, Citation1987; Oliver-Smith, Citation1996, Wisner et al., Citation2004) that appears to have made a strong impact on UN rhetoric concerning DRR. The idea that resilience is an (Thierney, Citation2014, p. 5) represents a shift from a classical understanding of resilience that separates the subject (individual) with an object (disaster) to a post-modern understanding that examines the mutual constitution of the subject and the object (Chandler, Citation2014, p. 7).
4. Note that the assumption that vulnerability is the flip side of resilience displayed in this quote from UNISDR can be misleading: ‘one person’s resilience may be another’s vulnerability’ (Alexander, Citation2013, p. 2714). Vulnerability and resilience can exist simultaneously and are not necessarily correlated (see Etkin, Citation2015, p. 125).
5. The inter-relation between DRR and resilience should be clear. Resilience is defined by the World Bank as the ability to ‘withstand, recover from, and reorganize in response to crises so that all members of society may develop or maintain the ability to thrive’ (GFDRRR, Citation2015, p. 27). This is similar to the UNISDR definition of resilience as ‘The ability of a system, community or society exposed to hazards to resist, absorb, accommodate to and recover from the effects of a hazard in a timely and efficient manner, including through the preservation and restoration of its essential basic structures and functions’ (Citation2009). However, the World Bank’s definition tends to emphasise the idea of transformability and adaption rather than returning to equilibrium.
6. Implementation agencies and other major factors include but are not limited to the IFRC, Red Cross Societies and UN agencies (UNISDR; UNDP; UNICEF; UN ECLAC; FAO).
7. Donor coordination is carried out by CDEMA and the Eastern and Northern Caribbean donor groups. The latter consists of a range of major international donors such as the World Bank, the CBD, UK Department for International Development (DFID), the Pan-American Health Organization (PAHO), the UNDP, UNICEF, USAID and the World Food Programme (WFP).
8. These three variations in the outcome of diffusion range in scale from little (norm resistance) to significant change (displacement).
9. Tainos socio-political infrastructure was destroyed within the first two decades of Spanish arrival (Guitar, Citation2011, p. 129), which included targeted killings of the Caciques (chiefs), enforced slavery and the destruction of indigenous agricultural practices (Fradera, Citation2011, p. 165–167).
10. By way of illustration, the current state of investment in local museums and art galleries is meagre. In some cases, such as the central Grenadian museum, important historical artefacts and architecture are literally crumbling away from modern memory (personal communication, 5).
11. Kamau Brathwaite refers to the invention of Reggae as an ‘alterNative iconography’ that is ‘positively TIDALECTICAL’ (original emphasis, 1999, p. 49).
12. The use of languages and dialects as an identity marker for Caribbean states is an important aspect of ideational development. For some examples, see Trinidad and Tobago’s Côté ci Côté la (n.d.) and the Dictionary of Caribbean English Usage (1996).
13. See Henke (Citation1997) who takes a similar position on the relationship between resistance and ontology.
14. The idea of self-worth is related to Nietzschean autoaesthetics that emphasises the invention of the ‘(un)self’ and ‘strategies of self-mastery’ (Evans & Reid, Citation2014, p. 172).
15. This definition is purposefully broad, recognising the different types of self-esteem and self-worth conceptualised and discussed by (social) psychologists. As self-worth is understood as ‘our evaluation of our self as being a worthwhile person’ (Psychology Dictionary, Citationn.d.), it is considered synonymous with self-esteem for the purposes of this paper.
16. Promoting a collective sense of self-worth in a closed system may inadvertently strengthen divisions between ‘us’ and ‘them’. This raises an important ethical question that ought to be reflected upon, especially if government policy aims to promote social capital. It requires sensitive planning to balance the desired stability, that comes through a sense of community, and animosity, that may build up between communities, particularly if the division between ethnic, racial or religious groups is unintentionally reified.