PurposeBased on the research, the authors identify how four key concepts in disaster studies—agency, local scale, memory and vulnerability—are interrupted, and how these interruptions offer new perspectives for doing disaster research from and for the South.Design/methodology/approachMeta-analysis of case studies and revision of past and current collaborations of authors with communities across Chile.FindingsThe findings suggest that agency, local scale, memory and vulnerability, as fundamental concepts for disaster risk reduction (DRR) theory and practice, need to allow for ambivalences, ironies, granularization and further materializations. The authors identify these characteristics as the conditions that emerge when doing disaster research from within the disaster itself, perhaps the critical condition of what is usually known as the South.Originality/valueThe authors contribute to a reflexive assessment of fundamental concepts for critical disaster studies. The authors offer research-based and empirically rich redefinitions of these concepts. The authors also offer a novel understanding of the political and epistemological conditions of the “South” as both a geography and a project.

Landslide disaster risks increase worldwide, particularly in urban areas. To design and implement more effective and democratic risk reduction programs, calls for transdisciplinary approaches have recently increased. However, little attention has been paid to the actual articulation of transdisciplinary methods and their associated challenges. To fill this gap, we draw on the case of the 1993 Quebrada de Macul disaster, Chile, to propose what we label as the Geo-Social Model. This experimental methodology aims at integrating recursive interactions between geological and social factors configuring landslide for more robust and inclusive analyses and interventions. It builds upon three analytical blocks or site-specific environments in constant co-determination: (1) The geology and geomorphology of the study area; (2) the built environment, encompassing infrastructural, urban, and planning conditions; and (3) the sociocultural environment, which includes community memory, risk perceptions, and territorial organizing. Our results are summarized in a geo-social map that systematizes the complex interactions between the three environments that facilitated the Quebrada de Macul flow-type landslide. While our results are specific to this event, we argue that the Geo-Social Model can be applied to other territories. In our conclusions, we suggest, first, that landslides in urban contexts are often the result of anthropogenic disruptions of natural balances and systems, often related to the lack of place-sensitive urban planning. Second, that transdisciplinary approaches are critical for sustaining robust and politically effective landslide risk prevention plans. Finally, that inter- and trans-disciplinary approaches to landslide risk prevention need to be integrated into municipal-level planning for a better understanding of—and prevention of—socio-natural hazards.

Recientemente, se ha problematizado cómo la Gestión de Riesgo de Desastres, o GRD, conceptualiza la resiliencia y los desastres en asentamiento informales. Mediante un estudio de caso cualitativo y una aproximación que problematiza la escala local, mostramos qué es considerado amenaza por la comunidad y de qué manera se gestiona. De esta manera evidenciamos que las comunidades se enfrentan a múltiples amenazas -pandemia, riesgo de aluvión, inseguridad alimentaria, escasez hídrica, inundaciones e incendios- que son gestionadas partir de estrategias que descansan en la organización comunitaria y redes de solidaridad externas e internas al territorio bajo liderazgos femeninos, colaboración equitativa, apoyo voluntario, identificación política y transmisión de conocimientos locales. Nuestros resultados sugieren dos grandes consideraciones a la GRD en asentamientos informales. Primero, que el concepto de resiliencia en tanto adaptación, debe expandirse a partir de voces subalternas y la noción de dignidad como categoría moral para la transformación, dejando de lado ideas de estabilidad y despolitización. Y segundo, que esta debe estimular políticas de desarrollo que se hagan cargo del problema habitacional y desigualdades de género, problematizando las formas particulares de relación y organización, y por ende, las categorías tradicionales de hogar.