Assessment of Local-Level Community Resilience within the Scope of a Disaster-Resilient City: The Case of Türkiye

Abstract

This study aimed to assess community resilience to disasters at the local level in Turkey. In this study, a community disaster-resilience index (CDRI) consisting of five subdimensions and 34 basic indicators based on the disaster-resilience of place model was developed. The developed CDRI was applied for 81 provinces in Turkey. In order to reach the data in the determined subdimensions, current data on the websites of the Turkish Statistical Institute, the Disaster and Emergency Management Presidency, and the General Directorate of Highways were accessed. The data obtained were analyzed using Analysis of Moment Structures 23 and Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) software Version 25 (IBM SPSS 25) programs, and general resilience scores were obtained at the provincial level. In addition, Geographic Information System software was used to reveal the spatial distribution of the provinces according to their resilience scores. As a result of the application of the CDRI developed in the second stage, it was observed that the majority of the provinces in Turkey had medium and above disaster-resilience levels. In addition, when the resilience scores of the provinces were evaluated according to the subdimensions of CDRI, it was found that the highest scores were in economic resilience and the lowest scores were in community capacity subdimensions. Therefore, it may be recommended to make plans to increase community capacity. Furthermore, the developed CDRI is expected to guide disaster management policies and investments.