Strengthening urban resilience in informal settlements: the SECURe framework in practice

This briefing aims to highlight the critical importance of inclusive disaster risk reduction and urban resilience in the face of rapid urbanization. It underscores the vulnerability of informal settlements-often excluded from formal planning processes-and introduces the Strengthening and Enhancing Contextual Urban Resilience (SECURe) framework as a strategic response.

Cities in low- and middle-income countries will continue to grow rapidly in the coming decades. The way in which urbanisation takes place will determine the risk exposure and vulnerability of more than two-thirds of the global population that live in cities. This calls for urgent, large-scale action and demands a focus on urban governance and social inclusion. The SECURe framework has been shown to be an effective approach to scaling the impact of ULLs, redressing structural drivers of vulnerability and fostering inclusive governance and planning. Funders should therefore respond to the challenge of urban climate risk by:

• Funding the deployment of the SECURe framework to ensure that urban resilience interventions do not inadvertently reinforce marginalisation or deepen vulnerabilities
• Funding impact assessment frameworks to evaluate how their strategic approaches interact with city-specific governance - identifying in which instances they promote inclusive, sustainable and long-term resilience, and •
• Embedding comparative learning mechanisms, including governance and impact data, within existing knowledge hubs to better document and disseminate best practices. This will support new ULLs in navigating institutional, cultural and physical complexities across cities, while scaling their impact and improving return on investment.