Böcker av Anindita Sarkar

This book focuses on integrated disaster risk reduction arising out of climate change and shows how communities build resilience through adaptive and transformative strategies at the local and global levels. It integrates disaster risk, uncertainty, and maladaptation to climate change with evidence from empirical research and a systematic review of existing studies. The book also proposes two important contributions, which makes it distinctive. First, it gives a systematic review of the literature to capture the changing context and concept of risk, uncertainty, and maladaptation to climate change. Second, it uses case studies from around the globe to demonstrate the ways that communities have fostered to build resilience to mitigate the impacts of climate change.There is a growing recognition that decision-makers often rely on intuitive thinking processes rather than undertaking a systematic analysis of options in a deliberative fashion. This latter approach requires accepting a plurality of narratives, embracing multiple disciplinary perspectives, and above all, integrating the appropriate disciplines that can help in finding better solutions. Thus, the book adds value to the existing knowledge on climate change adaptation, perception, and policy initiatives to address disaster risk reduction. It considers all these interconnected issues of risk, uncertainty, and maladaptation through a series of conceptual review- and evidence-based case studies to create new knowledge to address climate change adaptation and a resilient future. The book is a useful contribution to resilience scientists, policymakers, and practitioners from diverse disciplines.

The book empirically and theoretically argues that access to services such as water is the subject of political negotiations, mediated through identity, urban infrastructure, and the differentiation of urban spaces. The involvement of the public water delivery system has created a highly fragmented water-supply system and the troubled records of the private water vendors indicate to the fact that both public and private water delivery systems encounter significant 'governance failures' in attempting to extend urban water supply to the low income households especially in the slum areas. For the urban poor, the scarcity of potable water is a daily hardship which is accentuated in a heterogeneous society where crisis leads to marginalization, deprivations and conflicts. To achieve safe and adequate water for all, critical examination, reform or even replacement of the existing models is necessary to correctly respond to the failure of both conventional government and private sector models to satisfactorily 'provide water for all'.

This book explores water service provisions of the urban poor in the cities of Africa with particular emphasis on Kenya and its capital city of Nairobi. In particular the book addresses the insecurity of tenure, and how the colonial segregation of land continues to shape water access and service provision even today in Nairobi. The book seeks to understand how urban water management entails the "e;production of thirst"e; among the urban poor and documents how cultural norms, political commitments and seemingly mundane practices of water managers combine to exclude the poor from accessing water. Supporters of privatization argue that private companies may succeed where governments have failed in supplying water to the urban poor. The author takes a closer look at this argument, demonstrating the limitations of some of the current reforms whilst also exploring alternatives and solutions. This book will be an invaluable reference for students, researchers and practitioners working in this field.