Resilience

International Resilience Workshop (Talloires 2007) Participants' photograph by Gabriella Goldstein

Astier Almedom, Professor of Practice in Humanitarian Policy and Global Public Health at The Fletcher School and Inaugural IGL Fellow. Astier is the recipient of the 2008 Graduate Student Council Award for "Outstanding Faculty Contribution to Graduate Studies".

Over the last seven years, the Luce Program in Science and Humanitarianism at Tufts University has contributed significantly to the emerging interdisciplinary scholarly literature on human resilience. The International Resilience Workshop – which gathered leading research scientists, planners, practitioners, and policy makers to discuss definitions, determinants, and indicators of resilience – was convened in July 2007 as part of the Institute for Global Leadership’s new Global Public Health and Humanitarian Policy Program, which will build upon the work of the Luce Program. Astier Almedom, Professor of Practice in Humanitarian Policy and Global Public Health at The Fletcher School and Inaugural IGL Fellow, was the workshop planner, organizer and co-moderator with IGL Director Sherman Teichman. The workshop was a first step in the process of exploring the points of intersection between the various disciplines where the question of human resilience and/or the role of humans in maintaining institutional and/or ecosystem resilience is central to research, policy, and practice.

Among the invited international participants were, Richard Amlôt, Research Fellow based at the UK government Health Protection Agency’s Centre for Emergency Preparedness and Response, currently working on a three year study of public responses to incidents involving chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear (CBRN) threats in collaboration with the Institute of Psychiatry and King’s Centre for Risk Management, King’s College London; Dr. Svetlana Broz, Cardiologist, founder and director of NGO GARIWO Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, who continues to offer internship opportunities for our students; Lene Christensen, IFRC Psychosocial Support Reference Centre, Copenhagen, Denmark; Sarah Cowley, Professor of Community Practice Development, King’s College London, Florence Nightingale School of Nursing and Midwifery (University of London); Annick Filot, Social psychologist researcher and practitioner who has been working with Médecins Sans Frontièrs -Belgium, Operational Center of Brussels (OCB) to set up and coordinate the psychosocial unit (Stress Management Support) in charge of stress prevention, intervention and follow up of the MSF-OCB personnel in the field (including adaptive, cumulative and traumatic stress); Siambabala Bernard Manyena, PhD candidate, University of Northumbria, UK; Gillian Lewando-Hundt, Professor of Social Sciences in Health, Co-Director of the Institute of Health, Chair of the School of Health & Social Studies, University of Warwick, UK; Luca Pietrantoni, social psychologist, assistant professor in the University of Bologna, Italy, who also teaches crisis psychology (psicologia dell'emergenza), health psychology and military psychology in the Army Military Academy of Italy of Modena; and his PhD student, Gabriele Prati, Crisis psychologist and PhD candidate in social psychology at the University of Bologna, Italy. Currently working with rescue workers and police officers in prevention program aimed at promoting resilience and non technical skills; focusing on resilience and posttraumatic growth; Carla Uriarte, Clinical social psychologist, PhD candidate, Universidad Complutense de Madrid, coordinates the Psychosocial Care Unit of Médecins Sans Frontièrs Operational Cells Barcelona and Athens (MSF-OCBA); and Frances Westley, Professor of Sociology, University of Wisconsin- Madison, Director of the Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies, member of the Resilience Alliance.

The Tufts contingent included Douglas Glandon, Tufts “double Jumbo,” BA/MPH (2006; 2007), has conducted literature reviews on human resilience and social capital as part of a Luce Program research internship with Astier Almedom, including fieldwork on resilience in New Orleans, Louisiana; Jocelyn Muller, PhD candidate, working with Astier Almedom on understanding of social-ecological systems and local/traditional botanical knowledge in Niger; Dr. Joann Lindenmayer, Associate Professor of Public Health in the Department of Environmental and Population Health, Tufts Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine, who serves as liaison for veterinary students in the combined MPH Program; and Ayron Strauch, PhD candidate at Tufts also working with Astier Almedom on water-related issues concerning ecology and human health, focusing on resource management, behavior and water quality in the Serengeti ecosystem of Northern Tanzania. The workshop was convened in collaboration with Tufts University European Center Director, Gabriella Goldstein. Please visit the IGL website for more information on the IRP.

This year’s Talloires follow-up meetings and discussions include Professor Frances Westley’s visit to Tufts in March and Astier Almedom and Ayron Strauch’s participation in the “Resilience 2008” international scientific conference in Stockholm in April where Astier Almedom gave one of the keynote addresses. Plans for a Resilience Seminar at Warwick University (UK) co-hosted by Professor Gillian Hundt are currently underway.