Publish Date: 2024-07-15 15:57:46
We are delighted to invite you to a talk by Dr.Thaisa Comelli from the Department of Risk and Disaster Reduction at University College London (UCL).
Title: Radical Imagination for better cities: How can ‘envisioning the future’ with inclusion help reduce disaster risk?Speaker: Dr.Thaisa Comelli
Date: 22 July 2024, Monday
Time: 12- 1:30 pm
Venue: LHC 212
Abstract:
How can ‘envisioning the future’ with inclusion help reduce disaster risk? Phenomena such as rapid urbanisation and climate change are driving significant changes in our built and natural environments. This presents us with a small but powerful window of opportunity to act now to mitigate or amplify future disaster risk. Relying solely on past experience and merely reacting to hazard events is insufficient. Resilient cities must be capable of long-term, forward-looking planning to ensure that current and future generations can live fulfilling lives in harmony with nature.
This talk will discuss the advantages of ‘Normative Future Visioning’ (Pelling et al., 2023; Comelli et al., 2024) for urban development planning aimed at inclusive and equitable disaster risk reduction. Drawing on the experience of the global Tomorrow’s Cities Hub, this futures approach seeks to surface values and aspirations from diverse social perspectives, and combines methods from various disciplines to find intersections between desirable, plausible, and probable futures.
This session will:
1. Explain the theoretical and methodological foundations of Normative Future Visioning and its usefulness for interdisciplinary disaster risk reduction practice in cities.
2. Demonstrate the application of the approach in real-world contexts in the global south.
3. Discuss how similar approaches can be used to reduce disaster risk and climate change vulnerability in India, particularly in Delhi.