R.I.P. Resilience

Abstract

Resilience was set to rest on 30 June 2016 in Trondheim, Norway. After a two-year quest for meaning, the concept now lies with its neoliberal supporters. Resilience and I first crossed paths at the beginning of my PhD journey in Geography. I was driven by curiosity and an eagerness to put resilience to use: after all, who doesn’t want to be resilient? As the months passed by, I discovered the many different meanings the concept was associated with. Indeed, resilience refused to be put in a box. Yet, the concept contained some questions that I set out to try to answer in the “real” world. However, curiosity soon developed into frustration – resilience revealed a rootlessness that was disturbing. Was it a means to measure? A means to conceptualize why some people make it and some do not? Or, was it in fact, just a means to get funding? Certainly, it was not a means to explain. Therefore, resilience will for me forever be remembered as an approach to enter and structure an interview guide, but now we must bid one another farewell. Your legacy will continue to live on in the neoliberal agenda.