Flood resilience building in Thailand: Assessing progress and the effect of leadership

Using the UNISDR 10 Essentials for Making Cities Resilient as guidelines, this paper assesses the progress of flood resilience building in Thailand and its relationship to local government leaders’ abilities. The research showed that, since the flood disaster in 2011, municipalities in Thailand have made moderate progress in flood resilience building.

The results of a multiple regression analysis revealed that disaster resilience leadership abilities have had a statistically significant, positive effect on the progress of flood resilience building. The findings underscore the role of leadership in making cities more resilient and shed light on how local government leaders can contribute to the progress of disaster risk reduction. They also outline the academic implications and practical contributions of this research.

Disaster risk reduction has become a global strategy for making cities more resilient since the establishment of the Hyogo Framework for Action in 2005. The question that still challenges emergency management scholars and professionals, however, is what contributes to the progress of resilience building. Previous literature suggests that disaster resilience can be attributable to multiple factors, including leadership. But the specific abilities that help leaders promote resilience have not yet been examined empirically.