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This research asks how we can enhance the resilience of New Zealand urban communities. Resilience promotes a more rapid social and economic recovery following a devastating natural disaster. The research recognises the Civil Defence and Emergency Management Act's intent to promote resilience among individuals and communities so they can help themselves in times of disaster. The research aims to understand the likely response of New Zealanders to a natural disaster, so that disaster response planning grows within a developed framework of knowledge.
Resilience accelerates social recovery, and social recovery concerns economic recovery. We need to understand this inter-relationship in a New Zealand context so as to speed the economic recovery of the wider community following disaster.
Mobility, communication and information bind our communities and underpin their resilience to disasters. We examine these factors in order to understand their roles in shaping our responses, as well as their contribution to social and economic recovery. The programme will examine these factors in the context of a devastating earthquake in an urban New Zealand setting, but the generic findings will also be applicable to other natural disasters with the potential to destroy or seriously disrupt the normal function of urban infrastructure.
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