Resilience as Process: Rethinking Adaptation and Agency After a Catastrophe

Resilience has become a key concept in understanding how individuals, communities, and systems respond to adversity. Often framed in policy and popular discourse as the innate capacity to “bounce back” from disruption, this paper argues for a more nuanced and critical approach. Rather than a static trait, resilience is a dynamic, context-dependent process shaped by historical, structural, and relational factors. It is better understood as a social practice involving negotiation, adaptation, and sometimes resistance. This paper critiques the neoliberal framing of resilience, which emphasizes individual responsibility and self-governance, often in the context of limited state intervention. It suggests that resilience, as currently invoked, shifts the burden of recovery onto individuals and communities amid structural neglect. Hence, a more political and human-centered understanding of survival and transformation in times of crisis has been suggested. Focusing on the aftermath of the 2020 Beirut Port explosion, the paper examines how individuals and families navigate trauma and uncertainty through adaptive strategies. It frames resilience as both a lived experience and a political discourse, embedded in everyday realities, survival tactics, and acts of resistance. The role of NGOs and grassroots initiatives, often first responders in the absence of effective state support, is highlighted as central to sustaining community resilience. The study employs qualitative methods and semi-structured interviews with those directly affected, critically engaging with collective and community-based dimensions of resilience.