The limits of resilience: Knowing when to persevere, when to change and when to quit. By MichaelUngar (1st edition) (2024, Sutherland House, Toronto), 256pp, CAD 19.95, ISBN 978‐1‐990823‐56‐5.

The 2023 collapse of Wilko, a prominent UK retail chain, exemplifies the ‘resilience paradox’ in corporate restructuring—a compelling and counterintuitive dynamic within systems, organisations and societies: The very mechanisms that bolster short-term resilience can inadvertently sow the seeds of long-term vulnerability. To solve financial challenges, Wilko secured a £40 million loan from Hilco Capital in early 2023 and implemented cost-cutting measures, including up to 400 job cuts.1 These actions provided short-term stability but led to overreliance on external financing and reduced operational flexibility. Consequently, Wilko entered administration in August 2023, resulting in the closure of all 400 stores and the loss of over 12,000 jobs.2 This case highlights how strategies aimed at immediate resilience can inadvertently increase medium and long-term vulnerabilities, underscoring the complex balance between short-term recovery efforts and long-term sustainability.3 Resilience has long been celebrated as the hallmark of human strength and adaptability.4 Michael Ungar's The Limits of Resilience does not take the Wilko case but challenges this simplistic valorisation by revealing its inherent complexities and paradoxes with other examples. As Ungar argues, resilience is not the panacea; it is often portrayed to be; instead, it is a process laden with trade-offs, contradictions and systemic dependencies. Drawing on real-world examples, such as the evolution of Drayton Valley from an oil-dependent boomtown to a community grappling with diversification, Ungar highlights how resilience can perpetuate unsustainable cycles of recovery that prioritise short-term survival over long-term transformation.5 In light of this idea, resilience becomes a double-edged sword—offering hope and progress for some while exacerbating inequalities or vulnerabilities for others. By interrogating resilience as both an individual and systemic phenomenon, Ungar reframes it as a dynamic interplay of opportunities and costs, urging readers to reconsider its role in fostering equitable and sustainable futures. Ungar introduces and expands upon several concepts that challenge traditional understandings of resilience. Central to his argument is the ‘resilience paradox’, which describes how the success of one system's resilience can create vulnerabilities in others or even within itself over time. Ungar critiques the dominant view of resilience as mere recovery, framing it instead as a process of adaptive trade-offs—decisions and adjustments made by individuals, communities and systems that inevitably come with costs. He distinguishes between personal resilience, often characterised by individual endurance or ‘bouncing back’, and ‘systemic resilience’, which depends on the interaction of interdependent networks, such as families, governments and economies. Ungar also explores the concept of ‘resilience silos’, where one system's self-contained approach to resilience undermines broader collective efforts. By redefining resilience as an interplay of redundancy, flexibility and diversity within interconnected systems, Ungar provides a new idea to discuss how resilience operates across personal, social and structural domains and shapes outcomes that are neither universally positive nor sustainable. This book review evaluates Ungar's contributions, methodological approach and the broader implications of his ‘resilience paradox’ and other ideas. The book unfolds across 10 chapters, each addressing a unique dimension of resilience. From the critique of success-driven paradigms in Chapter 1 to exploring resilience trade-offs in Chapter 10, Ungar weaves personal anecdotes, academic research and policy implications into a cohesive argument. Ungar's exploration of the ‘resilience paradox’ is vividly illustrated in his case study of Drayton Valley, a Canadian oil town grappling with the boom-and-bust cycles of resource extraction. Traditionally, resilience in such communities is framed as an individual or familial capacity to endure economic fluctuations—working long hours during booms or scaling back during busts. However, Ungar challenges this notion by framing Drayton Valley's transformation as a communal and systemic process, where resilience extends beyond personal endurance to encompass collective adaptation and structural change.6 Drayton Valley's evolution highlights the paradox at the heart of resilience. For decades, the town's identity and economy were tethered to the oil industry, fostering a singular, short-term vision of resilience rooted in ‘bouncing back’ to the next economic boom. This narrow focus on recovery entrenched dependency, making the community more vulnerable to external shocks like plummeting oil prices and increasing global calls for decarbonisation. The paradox emerges when resilience in one domain—such as maintaining oil-driven economic stability—ultimately undermines long-term sustainability and broader systemic well-being. A turning point in Drayton Valley occurred when community leaders began to embrace diversification, investing in initiatives like education centres, renewable energy projects and social programs.7 These efforts exemplify what Ungar describes as ‘systemic resilience’, where adaptive trade-offs are made to prioritise the collective good over short-term recovery. The town's shift away from an oil-dependent identity required grappling with the ‘resilience paradox’: letting go of deeply ingrained systems that once sustained the community to create space for new, more sustainable forms of growth. By addressing resilience as a communal achievement shaped by interdependent systems, Drayton Valley illustrates how resilience is about enduring adversity and reimagining the future to balance competing priorities and trade-offs. Traditional narratives of resilience often highlight individual success in overcoming adversity, celebrating personal endurance and ‘bouncing back’ as the pinnacle of resilience.8 Ungar challenges this oversimplification by introducing the concept of ‘adaptive trade-offs’, where achieving resilience in one area—personal, communal or systemic —inevitably involves sacrifices, compromises or even vulnerabilities elsewhere. Ungar's central innovation is the notion of resilience as a paradox, where success in one domain often incurs costs in others. Central to this perspective is the ‘resilience paradox’: the realisation that resilience, far from universally beneficial, can generate unintended consequences. For example, a community's focus on economic resilience, such as maintaining jobs in a declining industry, may stall necessary transitions to more sustainable practices, compromising environmental resilience and long-term viability. Similarly, an individual's ability to persist in stressful conditions might come at the expense of mental health or social relationships, highlighting how resilience in one domain may weaken another.9 Ungar's emphasis on adaptive trade-offs redirects the focus of resilience from individual recovery to collective action and systemic change. He argues that resilience cannot be fully understood or achieved without considering the interdependencies of various systems—families, communities, economies and environments—and the trade-offs required to maintain or improve them. For instance, his analysis of Drayton Valley's transition from an oil-dependent economy to one exploring renewable energy and diversified industries reveals the complexities of balancing short-term economic stability with long-term sustainability. This shift required a communal willingness to relinquish outdated practices and embrace systemic adaptation, demonstrating resilience as a collective, forward-looking process rather than a static achievement. By positioning resilience as a dynamic negotiation of competing priorities, Ungar challenges policymakers, organisations and individuals to view resilience not as an endpoint but as a series of choices that shape the interplay between success and sacrifice. This paradigm demands a holistic approach, recognising that true resilience requires personal perseverance and coordinated efforts to transform systems in ways that address inequalities anticipate future challenges and balance the costs and benefits of adaptation. Ungar's systems-based perspective on resilience reshapes our understanding of how individuals, communities and institutions deal with adversity. Rather than framing resilience as an isolated characteristic of a person or entity, he highlights it as an emergent property of interlinked systems, where multiple networks—social, economic, environmental and institutional—continuously influence and are influenced by one another. This interplay reveals resilience to be less about personal strength and more about the dynamics of interconnectedness and adaptation. Ungar employs the analogy of resilience as a negotiation among systems to illustrate its inherent complexity. Each system operates within a broader web of dependencies: family, community, business or ecological network. For example, an individual's ability to recover from job loss may hinge on the availability of community support systems, such as childcare, education and employment services.10 In turn, the effectiveness of these community systems depends on governmental policies, economic stability and social cohesion. Resilience, therefore, is not the result of a single system excelling but rather the capacity of multiple systems to collaborate and adapt to challenges collectively. This systemic approach underscores resilience as a dynamic process involving trade-offs and interdependencies. For instance, a government might prioritise economic resilience during a crisis by subsidising industries, but this decision could weaken environmental systems by perpetuating unsustainable practices. Similarly, the resilience of a healthcare system during a pandemic may rely on sacrificing personal freedoms or redistributing resources from other sectors, creating ripple effects across society. Ungar's framework encourages a broader view of resilience, where the success of one system is weighed against its impact on others, emphasising the importance of equitable and sustainable outcomes. Ungar provides a practical framework for addressing complex challenges by framing resilience as a negotiation among systems. This perspective demands that policymakers, organisations and individuals consider resilience not an isolated goal but a collective endeavour requiring collaboration across multiple domains. Such an approach highlights the need for redundancy, diversity and flexibility in systems to ensure that resilience is distributed equitably and sustainably, avoiding the pitfalls of ‘resilience silos’ and reinforcing the interdependence of all systems in achieving long-term stability. Michael Ungar critiques the prevalent use of resilience rhetoric in recovery strategies, exposing its tendency to oversimplify complex realities and overlook systemic inequalities. In his view, policies that equate resilience with mere recovery—returning to a pre-crisis state—often perpetuate vulnerabilities and reinforce inequities. Ungar argues that true resilience is not about ‘bouncing back’ to what was but about ‘bouncing forward’ to create more equitable, sustainable systems. This requires a paradigm shift in policy, moving away from narrow, short-term solutions toward a broader integration of economic, social and environmental priorities. Ungar highlights how resilience-based recovery strategies frequently focus on economic stability at the expense of other critical dimensions. For instance, in resource-dependent communities, policies often prioritise reviving industries like oil or mining, which provide im-mediate economic relief but ignore long-term challenges such as environmental degradation and social dislocation. This approach, he warns, exacerbates systemic inequalities, disproportionately impacting marginalised groups who are already more vulnerable to economic and environmental shocks. To counter this, Ungar advocates for policies that recognise resilience as a multi-dimensional and systemic process. Such policies must address the root causes of inequities by redistributing resources, fostering economic diversification and ensuring access to social safety nets and environmental protections. For example, in his analysis of Drayton Valley, he illustrates how moving away from an oil-dependent economy toward renewable energy and community-driven initiatives created a more inclusive and sustainable model of resilience. This required economic innovation, social cohesion and political will to reimagine the town's identity and future. Ungar's approach underscores the importance of balancing competing priorities in policy-making. Economic resilience must be aligned with social justice and environmental stewardship to ensure that recovery efforts do not simply replicate existing disparities but contribute to systemic transformation. Policies informed by this holistic perspective are better equipped to foster inclusive, adaptive resilience capable of addressing the interconnected challenges of the modern world. By cautioning against oversimplified resilience rhetoric, Ungar calls for policies that go beyond platitudes to create meaningful, lasting change across all levels of society. Ungar's contributions to the discourse on resilience are undeniably transformative, particularly in his redefinition of resilience as a systemic, multi-layered process rather than an individual trait. By emphasising the interdependencies among systems—social, economic, environmental and institutional—Ungar broadens the scope of resilience studies, shifting the focus from isolated instances of recovery to the ‘dynamics of collective adaptation’. However, these theoretical advancements are not without their limitations, which warrant critical reflection. One of the limitations of Ungar's framework is the potential overshadowing of individual agency in favour of ‘systemic resilience’. While his emphasis on the interconnectedness of systems is compelling, it risks minimising the role of personal responsibility and individual decision-making in fostering resilience. Ungar's focus on systemic solutions can give the impression that individuals are passive recipients of external influences rather than active agents capable of shaping their resilience. This raises important questions about the balance between ‘systemic support and personal initiative’: How can policies and interventions empower individuals without fostering dependency on systemic structures? Ungar's work leaves this balance somewhat unresolved, pointing to a tension between the ‘macro-level transformations’ he advocates and the ‘micro-level resilience-building strategies’ individuals may need in practice. Another critique of Ungar's approach is the practicality of implementing his proposed alternatives to resilience as recovery. While his critique of resilience as ‘bouncing back’ is persuasive, the systemic overhauls he suggests often require extensive institutional reform, long-term investments and a willingness to challenge entrenched power dynamics. For example, his advocacy for economic diversification in resource-dependent communities, as seen in the case of Drayton Valley, necessitates significant political will, community buy-in and resource allocation. These changes are challenging to achieve universally, especially in contexts with limited resources, weak governance structures or strong cultural resistance to change. This raises concerns about the scalability of his solutions and whether they can be realistically applied across diverse socio-economic and political landscapes. Ungar's work also prompts a broader philosophical question: Can resilience ever be fully disentangled from recovery in the public imagination and policy discourse? While his systemic approach offers a more holistic vision of resilience, its practical implementation may require a new approach to recovery and transformation rather than a wholesale rejection of the former. This suggests that Ungar's framework, while ground-breaking, might benefit from further exploration of hybrid models that integrate systemic reforms with incremental, recovery-oriented strategies. Michael Ungar's reframing of resilience as a transformative, systemic process rather than a mere return to normalcy carries significant implications for policymakers, managers and community leaders. His work challenges these stakeholders to rethink traditional approaches, such as disaster recovery or multinational enterprises (MNEs) strategies, urging a shift from short-term recovery models to long-term strategies that foster sustainability, equity and systemic adaptability. Ungar's critique of resilience as ‘bouncing back’ is particularly relevant in disaster recovery, where the focus is often on restoring pre-crisis conditions as quickly as possible. This approach, while expedient, can perpetuate existing vulnerabilities and ignore opportunities for improvement. Instead, Ungar advocates for recovery strategies that prioritise ‘bouncing forward’, using crises as catalysts for systemic change. For instance, after natural disasters like hurricanes or floods, rebuilding efforts could emphasise climate-resilient infrastructure, diversified economies and equitable resource distribution. Policymakers are encouraged to view disasters as disruptions and opportunities to address underlying systemic weaknesses and create more resilient, adaptive communities. Ungar's insights have significant implications for MNEs, particularly in the context of global disruptions and ‘systemic resilience’ across their operations. MNEs operate within complex interdependent systems, including global supply chains, diverse regulatory environments and culturally varied workforces. Ungar's principles highlight the necessity for MNEs to adopt strategies that transcend single-domain resilience, focusing instead on integrating economic, social and environmental dimensions into their operations. For instance, MNEs can enhance resilience by diversifying supply chains to reduce dependency on single regions or suppliers, mitigating risks associated with geopolitical instability, natural disasters or pandemics. Additionally, embedding flexibility and adaptability into operations—such as using digital technologies to optimise resource allocation or incorporating circular economy principles into production processes—aligns with Ungar's systemic perspective. Beyond operational adjustments, MNEs must also engage with communities to social resilience, such as investing in economies and with stakeholders to address By these ‘systemic resilience’ strategies, MNEs can shift from to long-term that and to future Ungar's framework provides a for MNEs to their global and contribute to sustainable and equitable outcomes in the or regions where they These strategies are critical for ensuring that resilience efforts are not within domains but foster interdependent and reinforcing systems across its Ungar's advocacy for resilience as a process is a to action for systemic reimagining across managers and community leaders are to beyond short-term and strategies that for the interdependencies of systems and the complexities of resilience trade-offs. His work provides a for policies and practices sustainability and fostering a more equitable and society. Ungar's framework is not offers insights that can how communities to crises and for the future. in disaster recovery, or social his vision of resilience demands systemic that success as the capacity to transform and adversity. Michael Ungar's emphasising ‘systemic resilience’ and adaptive trade-offs, significant for research and practical particularly in and By reframing resilience as a dynamic interplay of systems influenced by economic and environmental Ungar offers a which and communities can more deal with financial crises and structural One of the critical insights from Ungar's systemic perspective is the of resilience across cultural and economic These deeply influence and as regions and industries levels of systemic redundancy, flexibility and For example, a in a diversified economy may have opportunities for to one in a Similarly, cultural toward and recovery can shape the strategies during By resilience models across Ungar's framework and to practices and strategies to the unique systemic dynamics of each For instance, how social safety nets and into can policy in other or regions where such systemic support is Ungar's focus on resilience as a systemic negotiation highlights its importance in In this resilience becomes a for organisations to adapt to regulatory changes or shifting This approach encourages efforts systemic sustainability over short-term ensuring that the is better to For instance, could adopt resilience-building strategies, such as diversifying investing in adaptability or embedding social and governance principles into their operations. These strategies with Ungar's concept of ‘bouncing forward’, using the process not as a to but as an to and ‘systemic resilience’. Ungar's ‘systemic resilience’ model also the of equitable and forward-looking Policies that systemic can ensure that to interconnected systems, such as and communities. For example, policies could to support or for to adopt sustainable practices during recovery. Michael Ungar's The Limits of Resilience provides a perspective on resilience, challenging and reframing it as a and systemic process. The in its argument that resilience is not simply about enduring adversity or back to pre-crisis conditions but about and trade-offs across interconnected systems. Ungar's insights highlight that resilience cannot be reduced to individual or recovery but must be understood as an interplay of economic and environmental systems. This redefinition not broadens the scope of resilience but also underscores the necessity of systemic change to address complex and interdependent Ungar's research illustrate that resilience involves adaptive trade-offs, where success in one domain may come at the expense of vulnerabilities in others. His case studies, such as the transformation of Drayton Valley, emphasise the importance of collective adaptation and systemic innovation over short-term recovery. By exploring the ‘resilience paradox’, Ungar reveals how traditional resilience strategies can inadvertently perpetuate and systemic The broader implications of his work to such as disaster recovery, and social where resilience must be to balance competing priorities and foster equitable, sustainable outcomes. The research of the book in its framework, which and environmental to provide a holistic understanding of resilience. Ungar's work new for particularly in resilience models across diverse cultural and economic contexts and integrating ‘systemic resilience’ into policy exploring hybrid resilience models that systemic reforms with recovery strategies and how resilience can be in various institutional and Ungar's to action challenges policymakers, managers and community leaders to embrace resilience as a process, requiring collaboration and systemic innovation to create a more equitable and adaptive future. His vision resilience not as an endpoint but as an negotiation of priorities, a framework for addressing the complexities of our interconnected world.

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