Through analysis of human resilience, particularly in cities, Professor Ash Amin believes that state guarantees of welfare and infrastructure will prove vital for our future – a view that is counter to much of the West’s current policy emphasis on the responsibility of the ‘individual’ in a turbulent age.
Through analysis of human resilience, particularly in cities, Professor Ash Amin believes that state guarantees of welfare and infrastructure will prove vital for our future – a view that is counter to much of the West’s current policy emphasis on the responsibility of the ‘individual’ in a turbulent age.
We need a return to the language of protection, so that the poor are given some of the basic infrastructure to deal with risk.
Professor Ash Amin
As global boundaries continue to crumble in the face of technological advance, the proliferation of possible threats has become overwhelming. The effects of climate change, rogue behaviour, financial swings and pandemics will amplify and take unexpected courses in this century’s complex and interdependent world.
Ash Amin, the 1931 Professor of Geography, believes that this uncertainty has fostered a new rhetoric of risk management, describing a future where we must become ‘resilient’ individuals. We are told that we can no longer expect to rely on our governments; we need to be vigilant and ‘prepared’ ourselves.
“This kind of shift is accompanied by a return to fatalist or apocalyptic thinking –public narratives of an out-of-control future,” said Amin, author of the recently published book Land of Strangers (2012), which examines the challenges of living with difference in Western multicultural societies that perceive the future as uncertain and turbulent. “In the late 20th century, there was a conviction that science and calculation combined with central planning allowed for future preparations.”
“Now, in the West, you have a public that is more informed but more sceptical, isolated and paranoid, and fed by a hyperactive media. The result is a potentially destructive mixture of mistrust, resignation and expectancy.”
Every step taken by states to develop new vaccines, secure borders and so on is accompanied by public campaigns that deliberately dampen expectations of their effectiveness. We are constantly made aware that comprehensive security no longer applies.
“Innate in a new culture of risk management by resilience is a cataloguing of risk-bearing subjects, so that management of our unknown future can be given tangible shape – vigilance against named subjects,” he explained.
“Catastrophism in a post-9/11 world has quickly turned towards vilification of particular humans – such as asylum seekers, the Occupy movement, Muslims, angry youth. It’s part of an active pathology of risk management, often hiding bureaucratic bewilderment in the face of escalating global risks.”
Such a shift in the calculus of control – from institutions to individuals, from protectionism to preparedness – has important urban implications. The Planet’s vast metropolises continue to swell as population increases, with millions migrating to the cities to find work in an economically precarious world. By 2030, at least 70% of the global population will be living in urban environments, with up to 2 billion dwelling in slums.
“I am an urbanist – I study cities – and urban resilience is central to our collective futures,” said Amin. “To speak of citizen subjectivity – the ‘resilient’ individual – in the context of those living in abject poverty is absurd. We need a return to the language of protection, so that the poor are given some of the basic infrastructure to deal with risk.”
“In the West especially, we still live in a society where people expect protection to be provided by someone else – but that requires resources.”
Amin uses Sweden as an example of a state that invests heavily in risk management, so that in the event of a catastrophe there is sufficient slack in the system of emergency services and welfare provision, allowing rapid recovery. But this requires a different form of social contract, in which acceptance of higher taxes means that the public have a right to expect protection by the state.
For Amin, scaling back the state when preparing for a turbulent future seems dangerous. While individuals need to be vigilant, he warns against scapegoating particular subjects for the risks we face. “In the end, the capabilities of everyone will need to be harnessed in a responsible and democratic way to meet the myriad risks of the future. We can’t leap into the dark with both guns loaded – shooting wildly at everything and anything – and hope to come out on top.”
Professor Amin has two further books forthcoming: Amin, A (2013) 'Surviving the future', Society and Space; Amin, A (2013) 'Telescopic urbanism'.
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