DOI: 10.4324/9781003157571-21
16 Conclusion
Deconstructing the dualisms
of elemental insurance
Chloe Lucas
In a globally changing climate, societies must find ways to live with the intensifying energies of the elements. As these energies coalesce into climatic events –
such as more frequent and severe windstorms, droughts, fires, and floods – built
environments are at ever greater risk of disaster. The global insurance industry
has positioned itself as the key mechanism enabling society to adapt to and
recover from climatic disasters. Insurance is itself a transmogrifying force,
capable of turning elements into capital, and danger into profit. The authors
of chapters in this book have shown that insurantial logics are pervasive and
powerful: capable of reconfiguring land, water and airscapes, citizenship, sovereignty, homes, behaviours, personal relationships, and global networks. The
ability of insurance to shape material and social realities can lead to transformative change in response to the climate crisis – but, as we have seen in this book,
what appears adaptive in one context may be maladaptive in another.
In Chapter 2, Lauren Rickards points out that insurance responds to
climate change in contradictory ways. Insurance is seen both as a pathway
to changing society’s relationship with our heating climate through adaptation, and at the same time as a means to defend and restore past realities.
As Ewald (2019, p. 138 quoted by Rickards, Chapter 2, p. 15) puts it, insurance relates to reality by ‘denying it at the same moment of its recognition.’
Insurance, thus, simultaneously offers to expand into new forms and markets to enable the continuation of modern life, while threatening to collapse
from overexposure to risk, leaving untold collateral damage. In this concluding chapter, we consider the capacities and limitations of insurance by
examining some of the apparent dualisms of insurantial logics uncovered in
this book. We synthesise the findings of these chapters to explore the relational dynamics of these dualisms: how insurance can be at once rational
and emotional; technical and political; individual and collective.
Rational and emotional
As Rickards elucidates (Chapter 2), the modern insurantial imaginary
enacts a culture in which recognising, measuring, and acting on risk is seen
as the only rational course. In this imaginary it is not only rational but also
16 Conclusion
Deconstructing the dualisms
of elemental insurance
Chloe Lucas
In a globally changing climate, societies must find ways to live with the intensifying energies of the elements. As these energies coalesce into climatic events –
such as more frequent and severe windstorms, droughts, fires, and floods – built
environments are at ever greater risk of disaster. The global insurance industry
has positioned itself as the key mechanism enabling society to adapt to and
recover from climatic disasters. Insurance is itself a transmogrifying force,
capable of turning elements into capital, and danger into profit. The authors
of chapters in this book have shown that insurantial logics are pervasive and
powerful: capable of reconfiguring land, water and airscapes, citizenship, sovereignty, homes, behaviours, personal relationships, and global networks. The
ability of insurance to shape material and social realities can lead to transformative change in response to the climate crisis – but, as we have seen in this book,
what appears adaptive in one context may be maladaptive in another.
In Chapter 2, Lauren Rickards points out that insurance responds to
climate change in contradictory ways. Insurance is seen both as a pathway
to changing society’s relationship with our heating climate through adaptation, and at the same time as a means to defend and restore past realities.
As Ewald (2019, p. 138 quoted by Rickards, Chapter 2, p. 15) puts it, insurance relates to reality by ‘denying it at the same moment of its recognition.’
Insurance, thus, simultaneously offers to expand into new forms and markets to enable the continuation of modern life, while threatening to collapse
from overexposure to risk, leaving untold collateral damage. In this concluding chapter, we consider the capacities and limitations of insurance by
examining some of the apparent dualisms of insurantial logics uncovered in
this book. We synthesise the findings of these chapters to explore the relational dynamics of these dualisms: how insurance can be at once rational
and emotional; technical and political; individual and collective.
Rational and emotional
As Rickards elucidates (Chapter 2), the modern insurantial imaginary
enacts a culture in which recognising, measuring, and acting on risk is seen
as the only rational course. In this imaginary it is not only rational but also