Capabilities-based Assessment of Disaster Displacement Risk and Pathways to Equitable Community Recovery

Population displacement following disasters is a critical challenge in disaster risk reduction. On average, over 25 million people are displaced annually by sudden-onset disasters. While this figure includes short-term, life-saving evacuations, many households remain displaced for extended periods, undermining well-being, livelihoods, and community cohesion. Despite its scale and impacts, disaster displacement is still commonly treated as a one-off outcome of housing damage, overlooking its dynamic evolution, multitude of drivers, and long-term socio-economic impacts. To address this gap, the CASCADE project introduces a human-centric risk and resilience framework—built on agent-based modelling (ABM) and empirical insights—to quantitatively assess the complex and evolving risk landscape of household displacement and recovery. The framework embeds human capabilities—the effective opportunities available for individuals to achieve well-being—to develop novel methods and metrics to capture displacement patterns, triggers for movement, and the well-being outcomes of these processes. CASCADE links household displacement with housing recovery models to simulate decisions to relocate or repair, incorporating feedback loops between household conditions, infrastructure recovery, and socio-economic dynamics. Key project outcomes include (a) new human-centric capabilities-based metrics to quantify evolving displacement risk and recovery equity, (b) an integrated simulation tool coupling household relocation with housing recovery and reconstruction, and (c) a decision support framework to evaluate interventions against recovery goals. By anticipating not only how many people may be displaced, but also where they are likely to relocate, how long they may remain displaced, and what needs will emerge, CASCADE provides policymakers, humanitarian organizations, and emergency responders with actionable insights for risk-informed decision-making and durable recovery solutions.