Learning from Resilience: Cities towards a Self-Organizing System

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A B S T R A C T The study exploits development of a new field of research with the aim of reading uncertainty and transformation at cities by revealing resilience systems thinking theory for urban studies. The paper first generates understanding the resilience framework and its critical identities. Secondly the city is introduced as a complex living organicism. Here the complexity of cities is conducted in the context of a self-organizing organism while conserve their spatial structure, function and identity. At this juncture; cities and their built environment are proposed in the framework of ‘being able to absorb uncertain perturbation and adapt itself through an adaptive cycle; of which key attributes of resilience is figured out a novel method for urban studies to be used to detain the taxonomies of uncertainty at identity of built environment. The study is concluded by impelling resilience as novel frontier thinking for postulating the ways of assessing a self-organizing city thinking towards uncertainty of change.

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Learning from Resilience: Cities towards a Self-Organizing System * Ph.D. Candidate CEMALIYE EKEN Department of Architecture, Faculty of Architecture, Eastern Mediterranean University, Famagusta, Cyprus E mail: cemaliyeken@gmail.com A B S T R A C T The study exploits development of a new field of research with the aim of reading uncertainty and transformation at cities by revealing resilience systems thinking theory for urban studies. The paper first generates understanding the resilience framework and its critical identities. Secondly the city is introduced as a complex living organicism. Here the complexity of cities is conducted in the context of a self-organizing organism while conserve their spatial structure, function and identity. At this juncture; cities and their built environment are proposed in the framework of ‘being able to absorb uncertain perturbation and adapt itself through an adaptive cycle; of which key attributes of resilience is figured out a novel method for urban studies to be used to detain the taxonomies of uncertainty at identity of built environment. The study is concluded by impelling resilience as novel frontier thinking for postulating the ways of assessing a self-organizing city thinking towards uncertainty of change. CONTEMPORARY URBAN AFFAIRS (2019), 3(1), 92-103. https://doi.org/10.25034/ijcua.2018.4686 www.ijcua.com Copyright © 2018 Contemporary Urban Affairs. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction “We know that we can’t design for every unpredictable event, but we can make sure our buildings and cities are better able to weather these disruptions.” (Mehafyy and Salingaros, undated) Today, one of the reason why a range of scientific approaches of urban studies fail in pragmatism is because they endorse a rigid conceal for understanding city and its built environment in a stabilized equilibrium, and also a steadiness of relationships. Since, change occurs perpetually in life. The problem of adjusting built environment and cities in equilibrium disregards the monarchy of change, which continuously exits. Therefore, the complexity of relationships could not be understood, or may be difficult to be rationalized in a model. Therefore, the growing challenges of shocks, depletion and destruction of change must endorse a novel vision for understanding cities as a system in a resilient form, rather than in a stabilized equilibrium. However, the intense here should not admire designing each unpredictable and uncertain event; but allocating built environment and cities in a better capability of adaptation or a self –containing towards uncertainties of change. The question is to understand how the cities could detain the uncertainly of change as a self-organizing organism and how coherent contributions from other fields reveling resilience thinking could be embedded in mean of resilient self-organizing cities. Therefore, in the next sections, the study presents the resilience thinking framework and its critical identities regarding the relevance of those magnitudes to the cities. First, the study examines several definitions of resilience term for asserting a grounded understanding of its meaning. Then, a theoretical review is accomplished for defining its critical identities. In the third section, the city is examined as a living organism that asserts a self-organism system where a complex interaction between parts accomplishes multi-equilibrium to conserve whole of the system in a stabilized equilibrium. In the last session; the study introduces the city and architecture in mean of adaptive capability or the ability to bounce back to equilibrium, of which is the domain dimension of resilience in a self-organizing system dealing with multi-equilibrium. 2. Understanding Resilience Framework and Critical Attributes 2.1 A Definition Over time, the term resilience refers to the ‘jump back, or ‘flexibility quality of a substance (Klein, et.al., 2003; Ledesma , 2014; Greene, (ed.)., 2002 ). As opposed to its original use, resilience term is also utilized as a conceptual framework to evaluate the ability or capacity of a person, object, entity, or system to persist in the face of disruptions or difficulty (Laboy and Fannon, 2016). In core, resilience is primarily utilized to describe ‘a thing’s ability to deal with change by remaining or preserving the same state or condition, or adapting itself to the novel the state or condition.’ (Morrish, 2016). In literature multiple approaches describe, discuss and explain the resilience notion through different meanings and methods. As examples from ecology, Holling (1973) provides a persistence system quadrant of the term resilience in multi-stability core drawing an ability to absorb change; Alexander (2013) from geography provides a detailed historical etymology of the term ‘resilience’; Bruneau et al. (2003) identifies robustness, redundancy, resourcefulness and rapidity as properties of resilience term; Gallopin (2006) thoroughly analyses the conceptual relations of resilience to interrelated key terms such as vulnerability and adaptive capacity; Klein et al. (2003) explore the usefulness of the resilience concept to natural hazard reduction. Some of the scholars accumulate defining resilience through in thinking of system attribute towards the disturbance; as ‘before’ and ‘after disturbance’. On one hand; Walker et.al. (2004); Allenby and Fink (2005); Fiksel (2006); Norris et al. (2008); Longstaff et al. 2010; provide a perspective to defining resilience regarding a system’s attribute in response to after disturbance. Walker et.al. (2004) defines resilience as “the capacity of a system to absorb disturbance and re-organize while undergoing change so as to still retain essentially the same function, structure, identity and feedbacks” (Walker et.al. , 2004). Allenby and Fink (2005) define resilience as the capability of a system to maintain its functions and structure in the face of internal and external change and to degrade gracefully when it must. Fiksel (2006) operates the term resilience “the capacity of a system to survive, adapt and grow in the face of change and uncertainty”. Norris et al. (2008) define it as “a process linking a set of adaptive capacities to a positive trajectory of functioning and adaptation after [emphasis added] a disturbance…. resilience emerges from a set of adaptive capacities”. Longstaff et al. (2010) illuminate resilience “the capacity of a system to absorb disturbance, undergo change, and retain essentially the same function, structure, identity, and feedbacks. According to Carl Folke et al, “resilience for social-ecological systems is often referred to as related to three different characteristics: (a) the magnitude of shock that the system can absorb and remain in within a given state; (b) the degree to which the system is capable of self-organization, and (c) the degree to which the system can build capacity for learning and adaptation. “ On the other hand; Tierney (2003); Kahan et. al. (2009); Gilbert (2010); describe a perspective resilience regarding a system’s attribute before and after disturbance. Tierney (2003) describes “the term ‘resilience implies both the ability to adjust to ‘normal’ or anticipated stresses and strains and to adapt to sudden shocks and extraordinary demands. In the context of hazards, the concept spans both pre-event measures that seek to prevent disaster-related damage and post-event strategies designed to cope with and minimize disaster impacts” (Tierney 2003). ” (Kahan et al. 2009 “We see resilience as the aggregate result of achieving specific objectives in regard to critical systems and their key functions, following a set of principles that can guide the application of practical ways and means across the full spectrum of homeland security missions… The objectives (or end states) of resilience that underpin our approach are resistance, absorption, and restoration” (Kahan et al. 2009).

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