152 ZJ Taylor
state and re/insurance industry figures are co-sponsors of scientific research
which seeks to translate risk science and existing actuarial capacities to the
valuation of perils in Southeast Asia. A history of ILS and its uses could be
drawn along similar lines, as instruments have been developed in relation to
underwriting capitalisation issues in troublesome submarkets like Florida,
and in turn retooled to fund a wide variety of insured perils, including those
beyond the horizons of natural disaster risk. Continued attention to the
contexts in which actuarial technologies are assembled, adapted, or abandoned can provide a fruitful line of analysis for understanding re/insurance
market transformation.
The case also underscores how the analysis of risk capital flows helps to
reveal where, why, and how re/insurers shape urban-material ties and ‘socialities’ (Christophers et al. 2020) within and between places and actors. First
Coast Re and other ILS organise geographically disparate risks and capital
flows to serve multiple if contingent political and economic goals. ILS provides a means through which the industry markets insured risk as an asset
class accessible to investors seeking new horizons of risk and return not
correlated with the broader economy. Not only do alternative reinsurance
products open up a new horizon of accumulation for investors, they also
enable financial services firms to capture economic value from risk management services, like brokering and modelling, the activities and capital flows
of which undergird international financial centres such as Singapore and
London. At the same time, ILS represents a promise to pay to insurers and
their policyholders, the confidence in which underwrites a broader range
of financial and non-financial activities. From employment to public sector fiscal capacity, Florida’s real estate-driven political economy depends
on access to re/insurance risk capital. Following risk capital flows through
market geographies reveals crucial points of tangency and logics of interdependency between insurance and other political-economic dynamics,
which can illuminate the structural importance as well as potential limits
of re/insurance within specific geographies. For example, Taylor’s (2020)
analysis of ILS flows in Florida illuminates the state’s expensive reliance
on risk capital markets, opening up questions about the array of (extra-)
economic values selectively re/produced through re/insurance (Elliott 2021)
and the variegated links between finance, property catastrophe exposure,
and urban restructuring (Taylor & Aalbers 2022).
As scholars of financialisation have long argued, attention to shifting state
engagement also sheds light on the geographical presences, absences, and varying public purposes of re/insurance markets. Mainstream insurance scholars and market advocates have at times conceptualised re/insurance using a
false binary between the state and market (Taylor & Weinkle 2020), which
obscures our understanding of the role of public regulations, investments,
and other activities in shaping – or even creating and destroying – the contours of re/insurance markets. The Florida and Singapore contexts reveal
multiple examples of entrepreneurial forms of state intervention in support
state and re/insurance industry figures are co-sponsors of scientific research
which seeks to translate risk science and existing actuarial capacities to the
valuation of perils in Southeast Asia. A history of ILS and its uses could be
drawn along similar lines, as instruments have been developed in relation to
underwriting capitalisation issues in troublesome submarkets like Florida,
and in turn retooled to fund a wide variety of insured perils, including those
beyond the horizons of natural disaster risk. Continued attention to the
contexts in which actuarial technologies are assembled, adapted, or abandoned can provide a fruitful line of analysis for understanding re/insurance
market transformation.
The case also underscores how the analysis of risk capital flows helps to
reveal where, why, and how re/insurers shape urban-material ties and ‘socialities’ (Christophers et al. 2020) within and between places and actors. First
Coast Re and other ILS organise geographically disparate risks and capital
flows to serve multiple if contingent political and economic goals. ILS provides a means through which the industry markets insured risk as an asset
class accessible to investors seeking new horizons of risk and return not
correlated with the broader economy. Not only do alternative reinsurance
products open up a new horizon of accumulation for investors, they also
enable financial services firms to capture economic value from risk management services, like brokering and modelling, the activities and capital flows
of which undergird international financial centres such as Singapore and
London. At the same time, ILS represents a promise to pay to insurers and
their policyholders, the confidence in which underwrites a broader range
of financial and non-financial activities. From employment to public sector fiscal capacity, Florida’s real estate-driven political economy depends
on access to re/insurance risk capital. Following risk capital flows through
market geographies reveals crucial points of tangency and logics of interdependency between insurance and other political-economic dynamics,
which can illuminate the structural importance as well as potential limits
of re/insurance within specific geographies. For example, Taylor’s (2020)
analysis of ILS flows in Florida illuminates the state’s expensive reliance
on risk capital markets, opening up questions about the array of (extra-)
economic values selectively re/produced through re/insurance (Elliott 2021)
and the variegated links between finance, property catastrophe exposure,
and urban restructuring (Taylor & Aalbers 2022).
As scholars of financialisation have long argued, attention to shifting state
engagement also sheds light on the geographical presences, absences, and varying public purposes of re/insurance markets. Mainstream insurance scholars and market advocates have at times conceptualised re/insurance using a
false binary between the state and market (Taylor & Weinkle 2020), which
obscures our understanding of the role of public regulations, investments,
and other activities in shaping – or even creating and destroying – the contours of re/insurance markets. The Florida and Singapore contexts reveal
multiple examples of entrepreneurial forms of state intervention in support