We Did It with Prof. Daniel Aldrich

In this episode of Doing Disasters Differently,  Renae talks with Professor Daniel Aldrich, a full professor at Northeastern University. They explore the groundbreaking development of a national framework for measuring social capital and social infrastructure in Australia, featuring insights from Professor Daniel Aldrich. 

Discover how these tools can transform community resilience, disaster preparedness, and everyday social cohesion.

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Transcript

Renae Hanvin: Hello and welcome to today's episode of Doing Disasters Differently. I'm here with Professor Daniel Aldrich, who is a full professor at Northeastern University. And I met Professor Aldrich like seven, eight years ago when he presented in Australia. And I heard what he was presenting on, and I was like, that is totally aligned to what we've been trying to do. So I stalked him through LinkedIn and asked him to be a volunteer advisor on our Resilient Ready Advisory Group, which he very kindly said yes. And for the past five to six years, we've been working on projects to build social capital and social infrastructure measurement in Australia. So this podcast is titled We Did It. And I'm really excited to be having this conversation with you all as listeners today and with Professor Aldrich around what we've actually achieved. 'Cause it's pretty cool, isn't it, Daniel?

Prof. Daniel Aldrich: It's fantastic.

Renae Hanvin: So we did it. We built a national framework to measure social capital and social infrastructure across Australia. So from your perspective as a global expert, obviously in this space, why is this such a breakthrough?

Prof. Daniel Aldrich: Yeah, a lot of scientists and decision makers around the world care about the idea that our connections matter and where we build them matters. But few have taken the time to really build a framework for systematically capturing it. If you read in the academic literature, usually it's one neighborhood or one city at a time. There's a bunch of articles that do the kind of work. And typically people like whether it's in Sydney or Melbourne or the New South Wales, those are territories that work by themselves. What Resilient Ready has done under your leadership, is build a nationwide process that means anyone across Australia can use the tools that you've developed and capture bonding, bridging, and linking ties. And then also look at the social infrastructure density, how many people nearby and where they meet. So that is a radical change from each state or each city works by themselves. Now we can compare Sydney and Adelaide. Now we can look at Darwin and Perth, right? Now we can look at areas like Hobart, areas that might not necessarily normally be on the same map together literally, now we can bring them together in one place.

Renae Hanvin: And I think what's so awesome about what we've created, and just to recognize we got just under a million dollars of funding through the NEMA disaster ready fund round two. We're so grateful for that. And also want to recognize the lead agency being SafeCom in South Australia, who we worked with to create a snapshot report to see whether or not this would be of interest to the sector. But I think what was really key to the development of it, we wanted to make sure that it was relevant to all Australian states and territories. So we went on a six week a mini tour, I guess, across Australia. I took you out west first. really to have discussions around, you know, what is social capital and what is social infrastructure. And we created descriptors, didn't we? So how to help people talk about it as opposed to what the definitions are.

Prof. Daniel Aldrich: Yeah, and the idea here was that we don't want to wade into all the jargon and thousands of pages of academic literature fighting about is it this or that, right? We want to know how does the average person in Australia understand their connections? What does it mean to them? And they talked about a place to meet, where would they do that? Right. And I remember oftentimes when I would have some arm wrestling contests, you know, what things do we include? How do we talk about this? And I think it's really important because this is not an academic exercise meant to be put up on a shelf, a one-time article that four people will read. This is meant to be a framework that anyone, a decision maker, a local social enterprise, a fire brigade, or some visitor who wants to understand where are the cold and hot spots in society, where are people connecting and having trust in government, where are people meeting together, that information is all in this framework.

Renae Hanvin: Yeah, 100%. So make sure if you want to find out more, jump onto sociabli s o c i a b l i dot resilientready.org because we have the national framework that is there. We also have descriptive videos. So they're videos that go for about a minute, minute and a half on what is social capital or talking about social capital and talking about social infrastructure. We also have information on our pilot communities, and I'm going to come to them in a minute. So I want to ask the question. I mean, social capital for years. And in the research that we did, it was right back to the 2009 Productivity Commission report, social capital was mentioned. So it's been out there for a long time, but it's been kind of hard to quantify. So it's a bit like, yeah, yeah, you know, I know what you're talking about, but no, no, we don't include that or we don't consider that. So now that we've got a framework, but we've also got a global first measurement tool Sociabli for Australia. How do tools like that and the framework, how do we change it now? How can social capital and social infrastructure be part of what we do every day?

Prof. Daniel Aldrich: Yeah, this is the crazy thing. You know, this map that we've built can literally integrate with any other mapping system that's out there. So imagine a health department in Australia that wants to know how do how do, for example, deaths from overdoses, or how do successful marriages, or how do low divorce rates, where do they come from? Do they connect to these kinds of issues? Or if they want to know what difference does it make if there's more or fewer parks nearby, or more or fewer businesses nearby, how does that change things, right? So these maps can integrate literally with anyone out there with a GIS mapping tool. ArcGIS, QGIS, this information and data can be used in any of those systems. And that means any question you have that can be mapped, right? So again, if you just want to know for yourself, am I living in a community that has more or less access to what we're calling social businesses, cafes, I would say karaoke bars, but those aren't so popular. we did find one, if I believe correctly, we did find one in Sydney though. so places we can meet together, pubs. you could find out, or maybe a new business wants to open and wants to understand, is this community one that's already quite rich in these facilities, or is it one that could use another one? So our thing has business applications, it has health applications, governments looking to a program. Let's say maybe you want to know, I only have a certain amount of resources. I can't make everyone better off. Who might need those connections the most? Who might be the, in a sense, the coldest of the cold spots? And that we can immediately find with this process, it tells us where the communities were connections are weakest horizontally or weakest vertically. And that's information until now that you had to guess at or sort of estimate by just driving through. Now we can compare community X to community Y, all the way down to the SA-1 block level, which is the most resolution we can get in a mapping system in Australia.

Renae Hanvin: And do you know what's so awesome? Like, I mean, I had this vision right at the start for this project, as I do, about, you know, the outcome that we're going to get to. And then I kind of, you know, we do a lot of engagement on the way to make sure that it's co-designed and created. But you sort of, I guess, I have this hope as to what the outcome's gonna be. And for this particular project, I don't know if I've even shared with you, but obviously Adelaide was one, or the city of Adelaide was one of our pilot communities. And then I had a meeting a couple of days ago and I put in a submission for a consultation for a strategy that the well-being team for the city of Adelaide has created and social capital and social infrastructure is right up there in one of the top, top priorities. I mean, that's game changing. So that's the outcome if we can get, you know, connections, trust and cooperation in those places that foster them up in those strategies that's not just limited to disasters. It's community well-being every day. It's social cohesion. As you said, it's health. It's loneliness. It's aging. I mean, the opportunities for change and, real investment in places and spaces that need it is huge. We're literally changing the whole approach to building resilient and connected communities, aren't we?

Prof. Daniel Aldrich: you think about what makes people's life better, like what improves quality of life, it's not typically a seven-lane highway or a new airport nearby or a bigger a bigger berm or seawall, right? People want to know: do I feel like I'm a part of a community? Do I want to be here in five years? Is this the place where I want to raise my kids? That sense of belonging, that's exactly what social capital is capturing. How much do I feel a part of the community? And in communities where it's low, that's precisely what we want decision makers to think: well, what's going on here? How do we make sure that these people feel They're connected to each other, they're connected into government, they have information and resources. And as you said, not only during peacetime, but also during disasters, we know from all the research that we've done that this is one of the most critical resources that you can have. Everyone thinks about buying a generator or having 55 days of water and food or all that kind of stuff. And that's great. Have your vegemite ready to go. But the reality is, right, if you don't have those things, but you're in a network that does and you have those connections, you don't need to go out and buy 55 days worth of vegemite. you have those connections nearby you can build with. And think also think about saving lives. We know all the data shows. When people are in trouble, when people need help in a fire or a flood or anything else, they get that help from people that they know people right nearby. So this mapping system, this framework really gives us a way to quantify and capture what until now has been an invisible but important part of our lives.

Renae Hanvin: So bonding, bridging, and linking ties. So as we created the descriptors for Australia and the national framework, we did have some arm wrestles. We had multiple arm wrestles as well, I must say. And I guess I really simplified the notion of bonding, bridging, linking ties. So as a simple version, I mean bonding ties, people similar to you. your family, your neighbors, your close friends, high levels of trust, etc. Bridging ties, people different to you. different generations, you live in different countries, you have different cultural faiths, beliefs, et cetera. Harder to make, lower trust, but really, really important, particularly in disaster recovery. But I would also argue in just thriving communities, because you get jobs through people who know people, et cetera. And then linking ties, people, citizens in society, and those in roles of power or authority. So all the councils we're talking to. and the state governments and the emergency services. Why do we need three? Why do we need three types of ties that we measure?

Prof. Daniel Aldrich: Yeah, a s a sloppy or easy approach would be to say all that matters is that we're connected. but the reality is you may have a really strong family, and I hope everyone listening to this does, right? Strong family ties. But unfortunately, if your house is flooding and you live together, probably everyone else that you know and like is also flooding. If that's the only ties that you have. in contrast, if bridging ties connect you to people who are different than you, who think differently, who live in different places, speak with an accent, they have a different way of understanding the world. those ties bring in information, they bring in resources. They're in a different situation than you in many times. And we also know, as you've said already, a lot of research in peacetime shows we often make economic progress, that is to say getting a new job, finding a new supplier, not through our family. They typically know what I know, right? My family and I share information all the time. It's the person who works right now at the local council who knows more than me. And that linking or bridging tie depending on how it is, that will bring information we I don't have right now. So of course We do want to have a feeling of connectedness, but it can't just be to the family people that look and sound like us. It has to be that we also have a broader network. Now we have all kinds of information, whether it's in the field of farming or high tech, whether literally it's in things like making contracts between lawyers, people with more of these bridging ties, people who are different than them, they tend to do better. They've got more information, they've got a broader view of the world, not just a narrow perspective of what their family knows, but a broader understanding. And interestingly enough, for example, during disasters. they tend to have better and more accurate information to act upon. So for example, before a fire or a flood gets there, these people who don't have just have bonding ties, but bridging and linking ties, they tend to get out in a safe way before that shock arrives. Unfortunately, people who only have bonding ties, they tend to stay put even as a hazard comes toward them. So that's really important that we understand first of all, our lives have different types of connections. You know, you and your mom and you and your mate from work, hopefully they're very different ways of interacting. Similar with you and a council person or you and a mayor and a premier. Or you you maybe give them a high five at the game, but you're not gonna go to their house and get a beer. So those different relationships make a difference at different times, and we need to have all three types of connections.

Renae Hanvin: And do you know what I have to say, like we do a lot of business community resilience workshops and community discussions and that. And I love nothing more than watching the local farmer and the local hairdresser talking about backup payment options. I mean, in the business community resilience work we do, social capital is absolutely one of the key components. Because again, the hairdressers got knowledge and skills that the farmer absolutely would need. And now they're more resilient because they've learned how they do it or vice versa. And that's, you know, we're all building resilient and getting resilient and ready together. So having those conversations through the connections and new connections is absolutely critical.

Prof. Daniel Aldrich: say you and I went to Kangaroo Island and we found there that a very small coffee shop had literally saved the livelihood of a local farmer, right? you know, he there had been someone in that shop after the fires there who was really needing help. And the farmer knew a troop, literally a brigade of visiting Australian troops who needed a job to do. And without that connection, the farmer would never have gotten the water turned back on and things working again. So we see again these connections can literally be, livelihood and life saving.

Renae Hanvin: Hundred percent. can you remember what was top of the list of social infrastructure upon all the communities that we went to? Pubs, yeah. Yes.

Prof. Daniel Aldrich: Pubs if I remember correctly. Places yeah, places to drink together, places to make those friendships.

Renae Hanvin: Yeah, 100%. And I think, you know, particularly in the regional communities, the pubs are the trusted places that people go to. So why are we not using those places and spaces like more to build preparedness, to have, sessions? I mean, I love working with councils, but don't get me wrong, if you're going to have an event in a council, you're only going to get a certain type of person who's going to go into those council offices. So if you know from the data that we can share that there are pubs or sports clubs or libraries or schools or whatever it might be that the community already trust and connect in, do disaster preparedness training there. Set them up as recovery centers. to me, it's kind of a no-brainer. So I'm hoping that yeah, the data and the focus that we bring on means that communities can identify the important places and spaces so that, we can set them up for preparedness training or for recovery. And I mean the data that you've had, I think from Louisiana shared that that's what communities come back for. They don't come back for roads or bridges or, you know, warning systems. They come back for the places and spaces that mean a lot to them and the people.

Prof. Daniel Aldrich: Right. I think we remember also we talked to people who lived in rural areas who someone had built a new shed and said, Okay, this will be the place that we meet in and they're all saying, Why? we've never been there, it's out of the way, we don't know there. There's someplace else that we go regularly. And those kind of moments, right, if you knew already in your community where this place that we call social infrastructure, which is a fancy way of saying where people get together, like a pub or a shed or a pool or wherever, if that's already drawing interest and has connections and ties. That's where you should be investing those moments, like whether it's a training session or a new event.

Renae Hanvin: 100%. And on our Australian tour, what was your favourite part?

Prof. Daniel Aldrich: Well, I am certainly private I love very much up in Darwin. we did meet William and Kate. Now not not the royals that many of you might be thinking about, but a massive male croc and his female companion, who is much smaller but much angrier, whose claws had gauged like a five centimeter claw marks in the side of the very thick plexiglass. So for me as an American, that was fantastic, watching them interact and watching him eat. quite a joy.

Renae Hanvin: It was quite funny for me watching the American watch the Australian or the crocodiles named after British royals. I think that was kind of funny too. Now talking about global success and connections. So I was in Dubai at the start of 2026 because I was flown over, recognized as a top 10 global innovator for products to support governments to build resilient and connected communities as part of Edge 50 with the Muhammad bin Rashid Innovation Center. I was so honored. I remember saying to you, someone's reached out from the UAE and I think they want me to take a booth at a stall at a conference. I'm not too sure, but I don't think I've got the funds. our marketing budget probably doesn't stretch that far. And the process was actually a lot of interviews where they really looked at what we'd created. But yeah, I presented in a forum to lots of government departments over there and Had photos with, you know, royalty, et cetera, to really recognize that what we've created is an actual change driver for governments. I mean, that's pretty cool.

Prof. Daniel Aldrich: It is fantastic. And again, you see here, this is not just a local town, like one city or one state in Australia, right? What we've capturing in this framework is something that every society has and needs to better understand. Whether it's UAE or Australia, whether it's North America or Canada, all of these countries, of course, are driven by the trust and connections people have. We wouldn't go out of bed if we didn't think that, the bus driver was going to be there on time, or I can. trust the dollar bill to go further or that can get my coffee nearby. All those things rely us to think that what's gonna happen before is going to happen again. That's a level of trust. And we can map those kind of connections. We can map who is connecting to whom, whether again it's in the UAE or in Australia. Yeah.

Renae Hanvin: And just to highlight the three pilot communities. So we're really appreciative for the councils and the community members of Adelaide City and also Whyalla and also Kangaroo Island. And the approach we did, I mean, we picked those because we're working with South Australia. So we wanted to pick three different communities. Obviously, Adelaide as a city, so lots of systems and structures. Kangaroo Island, very remote, you know, off the mainland. greatly impacted by the bushfires in 2019-2020 and Whyalla as a regional generational industrial kind of town. And when we did the research and we obviously pulled all the data from our ABS indicators and then I made you validate it like four times, which I think I drove you absolutely nuts because you typically do two or three, but I was like, no, no, no, no. If this is going to be real Australian data, I want to be able to say a thousand percent that it's going to be, you know, right. So we did qualitative research and it was so interesting to find and have conversations. So we also had chats with the mayors and the CEOs and whatnot. And I remember showing the map to the Wayala mayor. And I was literally like, why is that SA1 block darker, like medium? Because I would say that that should be light and it was relating to a linking tie. And he's like, Renae, no way. They're all the farmers. And they've been working really hard over the past decade to get on council. They're very connected into council. I was like, okay. And then there was another area in Adelaide, which I think for bridging ties, it was basically like white. Like it was so light, light. And again, I was like, is that wrong? is the data wrong? And they're like, no, no, no, they're dead zones. So basically, there's lots of international students and they don't go out and connect. They come here, they study. So it was really interesting the pilot communities and the different communities with different findings, but how relevant and valid the data was. It was interesting, wasn't it?

Prof. Daniel Aldrich: I mean, it's very rare in academia to have to go through a series of interchecks. So not just to use theory like we did, not just to use available data which we did, then to go out and do hundreds and hundreds of surveys like we did, but then to spend the time to go through to make sure that those surveys and the data that we've spent and the way that we're connecting them actually make sense. So it was a lot of time. I think honestly that we've probably spent the most time over the past two years, not just on data collection, but on really validation. many, many, many hours doing that. And I think that was worth it, right? We really want to be able to convince people that this is not, you know, my impression as an outsider, your impression as someone who lives there, but really data that's been validated by people who are there all the time, by citizens in the town, by the qualitative conversations you had with decision makers who know it better than anyone, and also by the theory that we have that's driven this for literally over a hundred years of theory on what social capital, social infrastructure means. So it is very well grounded and very well ground truth. And that is not something I can say, unfortunately, about every academic product.

Renae Hanvin: And so now, of course, so the grant finished in February. And then outside of the grant as Sociabli by Resilient Ready, we have started to look and pull all the Australian data in social capital to have a look at what that means and what the trends, et cetera, might be. So it's ready for all councils or state or federal governments who might want to purchase it to use. And it's been really interesting, I guess what the data's sharing. And we're not going to share it in this conversation as to what the data is telling us, but it's really interesting and telling. Like the trends across Australia and across different towns and regions is really telling. So hopefully in the future we might get some more funding to then obviously be able to offer it and do lots of frameworks that we're looking to do. But I think it's really exciting and interesting because the excessive forms of validation that I guess I requested. has really resulted in us having a true, I guess, national scope of data that's gonna be, you know, very, very relevant and helpful, as we said, to not just disaster areas, but also community well-being, et cetera, areas as well. So that's pretty exciting for what, you know, might the the benefits that can come to all Australian communities from that.

Prof. Daniel Aldrich: Exactly.

Renae Hanvin: Now, the last two questions, although actually can I you've got a new book coming out.

Prof. Daniel Aldrich: Yes. so October twenty twenty six, yeah, I'll have a new book called Beyond Common Ground. And it really is an exploration of the kind of spaces we're talking about. These spaces where people connect. So pubs in Australia, maybe bars, restaurants, gyms, even city halls could be examples of this. And try to understand, you know, what difference does it make if a community has a few of these, a lot of them, oodles of them. and I try to use different examples. So one would be extreme weather events like the kind of fires and floods we're talking about. The other is crime. What difference does it make if you have a city that has more of these green spaces or parks or whatever? And also even terrorism. looking, for example, case studies that I've done with USA Idea abroad to understand things like radio programming online and other forms of virtual social connections. How does that change behavior and therefore outcomes? So it's really a plea to us to think about. Many of our societies are be driven now by more fire trucks and more tech and more apps and all that kind of stuff. And we kind of forget that in many cases we actually really have in our society an amazing tool for making connections. A tool that is not just common ground like a library or a park we meet already, but the tools that we build in those spaces as well. And I try to build, like you've done in your work with Resilient Ready, multiple ways to show. This is not just my impression, some you know, drive-by social scientist. But really, this is the data coming from interviews that we've done and surveys, quantitative analysis and mapping to really show these facilities have a measurable impact in these different areas.

Renae Hanvin: So did you write it while you were in Australia at all? Like am I in it? Are we in it?

Prof. Daniel Aldrich: Some of it actually in Australia. yes. Cool. And it it may even mention the CEO of Resilient Ready. It may have a mention of the work that she does. because it it's important work, very important work.

Renae Hanvin: How many chapters did I get?

Prof. Daniel Aldrich: You have to buy at least one copy of the book, maybe two, I can't give away the good product.

Renae Hanvin: So the last question I always like to ask, doing disasters differently, what are the two things you'd like to see done in the disaster space? Now you've done a couple of these podcasts with me, so let's see what you come up with today.

Prof. Daniel Aldrich: Yeah, one is I think for us to really imagine what kind of place do we want to live in, right? When we think about our daily lives in Australia or wherever we are, New Zealand, America, UAE, what makes our lives worth living? Like what gives us meaning? And the more I've been thinking about this, I realize it really is relationships. So to see how important social capital is all the time, again, not just throwing shocks and disasters, floods and fires, but on a daily basis, with how much difference how much better I feel with a neighbor who knows my name. someone I can trust with my key. if there's a fire nearby, they'll help me get in my house. And all those things have happened, everything I just mentioned in our neighborhood. So that's one thing I would encourage everyone to think about how important these ties are. And the second is why don't we take them more seriously than in policy, right? If we have all this work that we do, all this money that we spend on organizing roads and building zones and schools and everything else, why isn't this invisible network something that we talk about more? So maybe we do see in Adelaide now. a call in health, which is a great start. But why wouldn't every city, every town, every small place really surface, bring to the top this idea that what makes our community better, makes people try we can walk at night because it's safer. They know their neighbors and then therefore they leave the homes more often. They know the businesses nearby and they shop there rather than online. They want to support school kids nearby so they help them go on school trips. Like all these things improve the quality of life. Let's make social capital a part of our policies.

Renae Hanvin: here, yeah, yeah. I've always thought, since kind of meeting you as well and all the many, many hours of conversations that we've had, of like it's almost like a vertical requirement across the whole of society. It should be, I guess, alongside, you know, health and well-being should be connections. So, which again, we're seeing some states and some communities driving as well. Daniel, thank you so much for talking with me again on Doing Disasters Differently. So I've been talking with Professor Daniel Aldrich. And we've been talking about we did it. We made the national social capital and social infrastructure measurement framework and Sociabli online mapping tools. So if you want to hear more, reach out to us. if you want to get advisory or you want to get mapped or you want to get some thoughts or have myself or Daniel come and present in your community, please reach out. Thanks so much, Daniel, and we'll talk again soon.

Prof. Daniel Aldrich: Talk soon.