Loughborough’s challenge for a more resilient society

As societies around the world change rapidly, they constantly face new threats, be it environmental or human induced.  It is vital to understand how we can prepare for future adversity – to develop rapid and effective responses in times of crisis and to strategize reducing risk in order to create secure and resilient societies.

This is the challenge set by Loughborough University through the Secure and Resilient Societies research challenge. Loughborough have established a world leading interdisciplinary research group, bringing together 150 researchers from 10 academic schools with cross-cutting expertise and specialist laboratories.

The research challenge areas include:

• Safer Urban Spaces – Designing urban spaces that are resilient to a wide range of external changes, environmental hazards and threats.
• Conflict Zones and Emergency Response Situations – The use of both traditional and social media in order to gather information from the general public as well as disseminate advice to them in potentially chaotic situations as well as an interest in human and technological performance and emergency management.
• Resilient Economic and Financial Environment – Research across other challenge areas with an interdisciplinary focus on the ways in which societies can be best placed to respond to changing global circumstances.

To support the establishment of the research challenge, a one day conference on Advancing Societal Resilience was held in February 2015. The conference brought together a mix of academics and practitioners who had an interest in resilience.

The keynote presentation at the conference was by Stephen Flynn, who set the context for the day. His talk covered the notion of resilience-based approaches and outlined a strategic framework for advancing societal resilience. Presentations which followed covered a range of topics including resilience to natural hazards, public health resilience and security and defence.

For more information please visit the Secure and Resilient Societies Research challenge website or contact the Academic Lead, Professor Mark freeman, via email at M.C.Freeman@lboro.ac.uk.