Fragility: concept and related notions

Abstract

Fragility is perhaps the concept that best represents the many uncertainties of our time related to different issues such as political and economic instability, energy and ecological transition, climate change, demographic and migratory dynamics. The article aims at conceptually clarifying the notion of fragility so as to try to differentiate it from other related notions such as that of vulnerability. It is pointed out that vulnerability is a notion that, unlike fragility, can be understood (in line of principle) entirely by means of risk analysis tools; and secondly, although both fragility and vulnerability can be regarded as ‘dispositions', they belong to two different types.

Introduction to Fragility and Antifragility in Cities and Regions

“…The concepts of fragility and antifragility have already been explored to some extent in the field of urban and territorial studies, as evidenced by research conducted by Blečić and Cecchini (2020), Chiffi and Curci (2020), Chiffi and Moroni (2021) and Shearer et al (2021). Additionally, a handful of papers have attempted to apply the idea of antifragility in some specific geographical contexts, such as those authored by Hespanhol (2017), Roggema (2019), Sartorio et al (2021) and Pasqui (2022).…”

Disentangling antifragility from resilience

“…Although the concept of antifragility was introduced by Taleb (2012), our use of this concept and allied notions is not an analysis or interpretation of Taleb's views. 3 The reflections presented in sections 1.2 and 1.3 were developed for the first time in our previous publications, Chiffi and Curci (2022) and Chiffi and Curci (2020), respectively.…”

“…By 'fragility' we refer in a broad sense to the quality of an object or system (but metaphorically also of a person, a social group, a territory, and so on) to be easily 'broken' (from the Latin frangĕre which means 'to break') even by a minor, ordinary or nonviolent force (Chiffi and Curci 2020). 'Fragile' describes an object or system -metaphorically also a person or a social group -that for intrinsic reasons can be damaged or can suddenly break even in the face of ordinary and nonviolent stresses.…”

Fragility as a condition: the landscape perspective

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Fragility is the outcome of a set of aspects related to and dependent on environmental, social, economic, political and institutional factors that require specific interpretation skills and novel operational attitudes (Chiffi and Curci, 2019) and that can manifest themselves in very different situations, places and environments. Fragility can characterise isolated environments, with resources that appear scarce or non-existent, or with a strong imbalance with respect to neighbouring and competing places that conversely appear dynamic and robust; it also characterises abandoned places or, on the contrary, those subject to the wear and tear of excessive pressures, as well as places exposed to known or unexpected risks.

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