A conceptual socio-environmental systems model of flood vulnerability in Kosi Basin, India
Publication Date
July 19, 2024
Creator
Abstract
The paradigm shift in flood risk management from a focus on flood hazard to flood risk requires a perception of flood events within a broader socio-environmental system context. To understand socio-environmental systems, scientific knowledge must be integrated with local knowledges. This paradigm shift began in developed countries like the UK in the early 1990s. There has also been a shift in the mind-set toward flood risk management in developing countries like India, but there is still an implementation gap at the ground level.
This research pursues a soft system methodological approach to understand the socio-environmental system in Kosi Basin, India, from the perspective of local knowledges. The stakeholders involved in the research were the communities living in the Kosi Basin, non-government organisations and local government officials. On-field data was acquired using participatory modelling, which involved semi-structured interviews and workshops. The interview transcripts helped define the temporal and spatial characteristics of the Kosi Basin system. It was recognised that the Kosi Basin system consists of three sub-systems with monsoon and non-monsoon variations, namely 1) the waterlogged community, 2) the Kosi west embankment community, and 3) the community living within the Kosi embankments.
Workshop data was used to structure the human-flood interactions in these three sub-systems into causal loop diagrams, which helped understand the interactions and feedbacks in the system. Moreover, a cyclic model depicting the annual behaviour of the Kosi Basin system was drawn. This model highlighted that the three sub-systems have different system dynamics and that there is no single homogenous pathway toward enhancing system resilience. The leverage point heuristic was used to identify places in the sub-systems where positive, sustainable changes can be strategically introduced to provide resilience to the at-risk communities residing in the Kosi Basin. The findings of this work show that local knowledges are instrumental in achieving a better understanding of a socio-environmental system. These new knowledges can act as a way forward to design and deliver robust and sustainable flood risk management policies to enable positive transformation.
Item Type
ethesis
Thesis Type
PhD
Supervisors
Subjects (LC)
Associated Schools / Departments
School of Geography
eprints ID
77387
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