Risk and resilience in the Asia-Pacific region: Managing the expected, preparing for the unexpected

Disaster risk reduction and resilience are gaining increasing attention globally as disasters affect more people and assets. The Asia-Pacific is one of the most important regions in the world, covering substantial amount of its landmass, number of people and share of economic activity. The region is, however, also the most disaster-prone region in the world. Consequently, disaster risk reduction and resilience building are of paramount importance to the region and, indeed the world. The idea of risk reduction and resilience building complementing each other is a result of evolving practice in particular in context of hazards and disaster management. In principle, such approaches are pragmatic and in the simplest of terms rely on the notion that risk reduction is a practice aimed at responding to the expected (based on the information gained from the observation of risk events that have taken place in the past), whilst resilience is primarily focused on the ability to survive the unexpected. There are, however, some notable differences between practice and theory in how the relationship between risk and resilience are perceived. This chapter aims at examining the current efforts in the Asia-Pacific to integrate risk reduction and resilience building measures into various policy frameworks, the disaster risk and black swans landscape in the region and to evaluate these in the context of theories of uncertainty, risk and resilience.