How do survivors perceive community resilience? The case of the 2011 earthquakes in Van, Turkey

Understanding and facilitating community resilience have been increasingly acknowledged as important aspects of disaster risk management. The concept is often described as bouncing back or forward following disaster events. Various attempts have been made to conceptualize resilience of communities and individuals to disasters. The present research aimed to qualitatively explore survivors' perceptions of community resilience in the case of the 2011 Van earthquakes in Turkey. To this end, in-depth interviews were conducted, as part of a large-scale study, with twenty earthquake survivors recruited through snowball sampling in Van. Consensual qualitative research method was employed for data analysis. The findings provided an understanding of both specific indicators related to resilience in the post-quake period and also how survivors perceive characteristics related to general resilience for earthquakes. The findings pointed out that resilience is perceived to be related to provision of adequate, timely aid and services distributed fairly and to good governance, financial resources, and faith following earthquakes as well as to awareness, preparedness and mitigation, and social solidarity before quakes. The implications of the findings for disaster risk management with a view of facilitating resilience and suggestions for future research are provided.