Can Community Resettlement be Considered a Resilient Move? Insights from a Slow-Onset Disaster in the Colombian Andes

Abstract

The degree to which communities can best withstand various forms of external stress, as well as what constitutes community resilience has been a matter of debate in discussions of development, resilience building, adaptation and transformation. Drawing on insights from a field expedition to the indigenous reserve of Aponte in the Colombian Andes, this paper engages with the concept of transformational- and community resilience and problematizes the concept focusing particularly on its tendency to assume that disasters are one-off, sudden events that allow for sustainable recovery in their aftermath. Aponte faces complete ruination by a slow-onset geological hazard which has prompted discussions of relocation among other solutions – raising questions of whether and how resilience can be understood in the context of perpetually worsening conditions of environmental change.