Social-Community framework

The Tajogaite volcanic eruption had a direct impact on a region with fairly precise boundaries where around 33,000 inhabitants lived in 2021, creating a thriving territory of settlement, relations and diversified activities. Functions that were greatly altered, both by its material destruction and by the disarticulation that the volcano caused in all aspects of life in the Aridane Valley. All of this caused an immense community and multi-scale reaction, which involved, on the one hand, the protagonists of the socio-territorial reality itself, and on the other, a wide range of external agents who were involved, first in aid and then in the dynamics of material reconstruction and socio-economic recovery, including the sphere of strategic planning. This posed multiple challenges, from the management of the emergency and the situation of displaced persons, to the approach to governance in a context of high concurrence of institutions and organizations of different nature, purposes, competences, areas of action, knowledge of local particularities, etc. A process with a high degree of interactions and contrasting interests, in which latent conflicts emerged and new frameworks of disagreement were generated, including, in addition, its coincidence with the holding of several electoral calls. Scientific research has not been alien to these circumstances, activating different lines of work with relevant participation of local actors – it is worth highlighting the technical dimension – the objective of this presentation being to make them visible, share them and discuss their main results, aspiring to formulate promising proposals for continuity with the capacity for social transfer within and outside the island of La Palma.