Urban Resilience - (Planning, Environment, Cities) by Jon Coaffee & Peter Lee (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

As the cities of the world increasingly come under threat from crisis and disaster, planners are searching for ways to build resilience into the foundations of modern urban centres.

This important book provides a comprehensive account of the theory and practice of urban resilience in response to a range of disruptions, including terrorism, climate change and economic crises. It examines how the concepts and principles of resilience exert increasing significant influence over the form and function of planning. Discussing a 'politics of resilience' in which fundamental questions of social and spatial justice are posed, this book examines how urban planners are increasingly tasked with the responsibility of safeguarding the future of urbanised centres and those that live in them.

Drawing on international examples and detailed case-studies, this book provides a nuanced account of the uses, and misuses, of resilience and points a way forward for planning activity, from an approach that is too often narrowly technical in focus towards an integrated and adaptable model for coping with risk, crisis and uncertainty. It will make essential reading for students of urban planning and researchers alike.

From the Back Cover

This important book provides a comprehensive account of the theory and practice of urban resilience in response to a range of disruptions, including terrorism, climate change and economic crises. It examines how the concepts and principles of resilience exert increasing significant influence over the form and function of planning. Discussing a 'politics of resilience' in which fundamental questions of social and spatial justice are posed, this book examines how urban planners are increasingly tasked with the responsibility of safeguarding the future of urbanised centres and those that live in them.

Drawing on international examples and detailed case-studies, this book provides a nuanced account of the uses, and misuses, of resilience and points a way forward for planning activity, from an approach that is too often narrowly technical in focus towards an integrated and adaptable model for coping with risk, crisis and uncertainty. It will make essential reading for students of urban planning and researchers alike.

About the Author

Jon Coaffee is Professor of Urban Geography and Director of the Resilient Cities Laboratory and the Warwick Institute for the Science of Cities at the University of Warwick, UK, and an exchange Professor at New York University, USA.

Peter Lee is Senior Lecturer in Urban and Regional Studies and former Director of the Centre for Urban and Regional Studies at the University of Birmingham, UK.
Jon Coaffee is Professor of Urban Geography and Director of the Resilient Cities Laboratory and the Warwick Institute for the Science of Cities at the University of Warwick, UK, and an exchange Professor at New York University, USA.

Peter Lee is Senior Lecturer in Urban and Regional Studies and former Director of the Centre for Urban and Regional Studies at the University of Birmingham, UK.