Rights statement: This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis in Annals of the American Association of Geographers on 22/06/2017, available online: http://www.tandfonline.com/10.1080/24694452.2017.1325726
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Final published version
Licence: CC BY: Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License
Research output: Contribution to Journal/Magazine › Journal article › peer-review
Research output: Contribution to Journal/Magazine › Journal article › peer-review
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TY - JOUR
T1 - Social vulnerability to climatic shocks is shaped by urban accessibility
AU - Parry, Luke Thomas Wyn
AU - Davies, Gemma
AU - Almeida, Oriana
AU - Frausin Bustamante, Gina Giovanna
AU - de Moraés, Andre
AU - Rivero, Sergio
AU - Filizola, Naziano
AU - Torres, Patricia
N1 - This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis in Annals of the American Association of Geographers on 22/06/2017, available online: http://www.tandfonline.com/10.1080/24694452.2017.1325726
PY - 2018/1
Y1 - 2018/1
N2 - Despite growing interest in urban vulnerability to climatic change, there is no systematic understanding of why some urban centers have greater social vulnerability than others. In this article, we ask whether the social vulnerability of Amazonian cities to floods and droughts is linked to differences in their spatial accessibility. To assess the accessibility of 310 urban centers, we developed a travel network and derived measures of connectivity and geographical remoteness. We found that 914,654 people live in roadless urban centers (n = 68) located up to 2,820km from their state capital. We then tested whether accessibility measures explained interurban differences in quantitative measures of social sensitivity, adaptive capacity, and an overlooked risk area, food system sensitivity. Accessibility explained marked variation in indicators of each of these dimensions and, hence, for the first time, we show an underlying spatial basis for social vulnerability. For instance, floods pose a greater disease risk in less accessible urban centers because inadequate sanitation in these places exposes inhabitants to environmental pollution and contaminated water, exacerbated by poverty and governance failures. Exploring the root causes of these spatial inequalities, we show how remote and roadless cities in Amazonia have been historically marginalized and their citizens exposed to structural violence and economic disadvantage. Paradoxically, we found that places with the highest social vulnerability have the greatest natural and cultural assets (rainforest, indigenous peoples, and protected areas). We conclude that increasing accessibility through road building would be maladaptive, exposing marginalized people to further harm and exacerbating climatic change by driving deforestation.
AB - Despite growing interest in urban vulnerability to climatic change, there is no systematic understanding of why some urban centers have greater social vulnerability than others. In this article, we ask whether the social vulnerability of Amazonian cities to floods and droughts is linked to differences in their spatial accessibility. To assess the accessibility of 310 urban centers, we developed a travel network and derived measures of connectivity and geographical remoteness. We found that 914,654 people live in roadless urban centers (n = 68) located up to 2,820km from their state capital. We then tested whether accessibility measures explained interurban differences in quantitative measures of social sensitivity, adaptive capacity, and an overlooked risk area, food system sensitivity. Accessibility explained marked variation in indicators of each of these dimensions and, hence, for the first time, we show an underlying spatial basis for social vulnerability. For instance, floods pose a greater disease risk in less accessible urban centers because inadequate sanitation in these places exposes inhabitants to environmental pollution and contaminated water, exacerbated by poverty and governance failures. Exploring the root causes of these spatial inequalities, we show how remote and roadless cities in Amazonia have been historically marginalized and their citizens exposed to structural violence and economic disadvantage. Paradoxically, we found that places with the highest social vulnerability have the greatest natural and cultural assets (rainforest, indigenous peoples, and protected areas). We conclude that increasing accessibility through road building would be maladaptive, exposing marginalized people to further harm and exacerbating climatic change by driving deforestation.
KW - EXTREME EVENTS
KW - BRAZIL
KW - SPATIAL INEQUALITIES
KW - REMOTENESS
KW - CITIES
U2 - 10.1080/24694452.2017.1325726
DO - 10.1080/24694452.2017.1325726
M3 - Journal article
VL - 108
SP - 125
EP - 143
JO - Annals of the Association of American Geographers
JF - Annals of the Association of American Geographers
SN - 0004-5608
IS - 1
ER -