Urban resilience efforts must consider social and political forces
The social and political norms, values, rules, and relationships that undergird and structure the myriad decisions made by public and private actors—what we call “socio-political infrastructure”—are likely to be as influential in urban vulnerability dynamics as “hard” infrastructure and environmental management. Urban planning for enhanced resilience and sustainability is ultimately a complex social and political process. Socio-political infrastructure creates patterns of behavior and action that shape the built environment. Developing more sustainable pathways of urban development hinges on making this socio-political infrastructure transparent and legible in the tools and approaches available for risk management. We argue that sustainability science is in the position to create the tools, methods, and strategies to identify, represent, and communicate the significance of these social and political processes to decision makers at all levels
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Reading Development 