Post-disaster dynamics in inner areas. An Italian hypothesis for transition management

The city can be defined as a balanced relation among polis, civitas and urbs (Salzano, 1998). Disasters impact this balance. Undermining the link between the components as well as the component themselves, the disaster can lead a city to the death, especially if the balance is already damaged (Edgington, 2010), at the same time it can represent the opportunity for changing the development trajectory of the territory (May and Williams, 2012). The catalyst effect of a disaster, and in particular of an earthquake, emerges more evident in inner areas where generally there are ongoing negative demographic and socio-economic trends (Barca, 2014). With this premise, the chapter proposes an overview of Italian reconstruction processes from the post-war period until today with the main aim of highlighting the dynamics of disaster governance and community organization, which are often less visible in the ordinary circumstances. The approach to reconstruction used seems not to be able to stem these phenomena and to reverse trends in order to “revitalize” the territories. The chapter aims to show the possible application of a flexible tool, such as the Transition Management approach, to the issue of post-disaster management in inner areas. Basing our study on transition management theories and (Rotmans et al., 2001; Bosch and Rotmans, 2008) disaster and post-disaster literature, the research uses the window of opportunity concept to connect the concepts of development trajectory, transition, trajectory break and trajectory reshape. Finally, the aims of the research are explained under the light of the ultimate goal of contributing to resilience-building vocation of the National Strategy (Barca et al., 2013).