This document discusses how smart villages that utilize decentralized infrastructure, ICT, and community engagement can help build resilience against shocks like natural disasters. It provides examples of how smart village approaches helped communities in Nepal, West Africa, Tuvalu, and Pondicherry recover from disasters and stresses the importance of maintaining infrastructure, integrating policymaking, and accounting for unintended consequences of new technologies. The document suggests a smart decentralized approach to rural development and disaster recovery could be lower cost and increase self-sustainability and resilience compared to centralized models.