Rethinking urban risk and resettlement in the Global South, edited by Cassidy Johnson, Garima Jain, and Allan Lavell

Abstract

Facing disproportionately many mankind-induced risks and natural hazards, low-income populations in the Global South are also exposed to another threat, namely resettlement and relocation processes, although they are meant to reduce the risk of disaster. On many occasions, national and local governments as well as international funding agencies regard these as good measures. The problem is: “While this may reduce people’s exposure to hazard, it can lead to numerous other problems, which can leave people more vulnerable or worse off than they were before [given the fact that it is a difficult task to] “reconstitute their livelihoods and their infrastructural, economic, social, cultural and psychological foundations”.