The pentagon of vulnerability and resilience: A methodological proposal in development economics by using graph theory

Several assessments of vulnerability and resilience have been attempted at a country level through composite indices but they are barely in accord with a holistic view of sustainable development. We suggest graph theory to structure a network of variables that depict vulnerability and resilience from a sustainable development perspective. Vulnerability is defined as the propensity to incur adverse shocks whereas resilience is the capacity to cope with their negative effects. We identify two control dimensions of vulnerability–resilience (economic and political) and three contingency factors (the social, environmental and the peripheral dimensions). The specificity of the control dimensions is rooted in their impact on all other sides of the pentagon. We propose an algorithm to select the key variables useful in building a composite index that conforms to the structure of these five dimensions while preventing loss of information. An application is provided on Singapore, which has been specified as a typical case of resilience.