‘To be bent without breaking …’: Resilience to Water Scarcity in an Informal Settlement in Lima, Peru

The study examines the proposition that ways of experiencing an environment are inextricably linked to ways of acting within it. It does this by investigating resilience to urban water scarcity in an environment of rapid change along three proxy indicators; perceptions, control and flexibility. Resilience is holistically defined as pertaining to both individuals and their supporting environments; and with a focus on positive, long-term outcomes. The study provides empirical evidence that understanding the experienced dimensions of urban water scarcity is a vital prerequisite for a holistic conceptualization of this phenomenon and that it can act to bridge the divide between the socio-political construction and the human experience of urban water scarcity. The methodology is designed to elicit depth, rather than breadth of understanding, whilst addressing the need for conceptual generalization that advances theoretical perspectives that may be instructive in studying other, albeit different cases of urban water scarcity elsewhere. Twenty-three households in two neighbourhoods of one informal settlement in Lima, Peru; and eight institutional stakeholders collaborated in the production of data during five months in the Peruvian autumn of 2012. The study finds that participants did not have sufficient water to meet their basic needs and that water scarcity existed along its indicators of quantity, quality and security of access. Specifically, the study finds that the onus of addressing the effects of water scarcity lay almost entirely on end users, whilst their ability and means for doing so were heavily constrained by individual capacities for adjustment and by features of a disabling environment. Participants’ constraints on considering the best action available, making informed decisions and deploying appropriate responses to water scarcity arose from a combination of having become normalized to the water scarce environment; the effects of the interaction of multiple forms of scarcity; the overwhelming number of water-related tasks consuming resources including time and mental capacity; and from the effects of inequality operating at different scales. These constraints resulted in processes of short-termism, loss of trust in their ability to effect change and in individualization, which further limited the capacity for resilience. The study makes a number of contributions to the literatures on (water) scarcity, rapid change and resilience. It finds that water, due to its vital role to daily survival, is a distinct type of resource that is not amenable to generalization to other, non-vital types of scarcity. The interaction of water scarcity with other types of scarcity operating at different scales is found to diminish resilience. The study provides evidence for the need to define resilience as comprising long-term, positive outcomes as it found short-term responses to water scarcity to attract more severe, longer-term challenges. Further, it provides lessons for our understanding of the constraints of rapid urbanization on residents’ ability to construct livelihoods, evidenced by findings which show that residents’ livelihoods are suspended in a context of rapid change. The study further documents the interaction of multiple, nested scales of water scarcity and the difficulty of assessing their effects on the ability to develop resilience in the long term. The study’s findings suggest that the concept of resilience, in contexts of vital resource scarcity, cannot reasonably be employed as an aim, but can usefully serve as an indicator for identifying the most appropriate areas of intervention or support. The study concludes that chronological compliance, or prior institutional provision of enabling conditions is required before household resilience can unfold to its full potential.

Grantor dc:publisher

Oxford Brookes University

Year dc:date

2016

Author dc:creator

• Wedel, Julia Mareike

Contributors dc:contributor

• Vellinga, Marcel
• Piquard, Brigitte

Statement dc:rights

• All rights reserved

Language dc:language

en

DOI dc:identifier

https://doi.org/10.24384/pthp-hr68

OAI identifier oai:identifier

tle:62808e45-1595-47c6-90d1-d8f6e02475c6:d6bd9758-527a-46cd-bfe2-c433766e8fca:1