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Adaptations made by agrarian households in the face of global change risks are largely dependent on their livelihood goals. I argue that adaptation-limit research is crucial to many agrarian development programs because a focus on adaptation limits may allow researchers and practitioners to better understand and support successful adaptation and allow smallholders to pursue their goals. In this study of smallholder farming in Northwest Costa Rica, I found that security and the unique parcelero identity of rice farmers in this region define livelihood goals. I show that an understanding of the multidimensionality and fluidity of farmer livelihood goals may enrich our current understanding of actor-centered adaptation limits as insurmountable thresholds. In response to worsening global change risks, farmers in this study traded off certain goals to pursue others. In this way, farmers do not perceive adaptation limits as insurmountable. Alternative indicators of adaptation limits did exist; irreversibility in adaptation and the great hardship associated with tradeoffs among livelihood goals may mark adaptation limits.

Warner, BP

Understanding actor-centered adaptation limits in smallholder agriculture in the Central American dry tropics

Agriculture and Human Values

https://doi.org/10.1007/s10460-015-9661-4

Recent evidence shows that climate change is leading to irreversible and existential impacts on vulnerable communities and countries across the globe. Among other effects, this has given rise to public debate and engagement around notions of climate crisis and emergency. The Loss and Damage (L&D) policy debate has emphasized these aspects over the last three decades. Yet, despite institutionalization through an article on L&D by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in the Paris Agreement, the debate has remained vague, particularly with reference to its remit and relationship to adaptation policy and practice. Research has recently made important strides forward in terms of developing a science perspective on L&D. This article reviews insights derived from recent publications by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and others, and presents the implications for science and policy. Emerging evidence on hard and soft adaptation limits in certain systems, sectors and regions holds the potential to further build momentum for climate policy to live up to the Paris ambition of stringent emission reductions and to increase efforts to support the most vulnerable. L&D policy may want to consider actions to extend soft adaptation limits and spur transformational, that is, non-standard risk management and adaptation, so that limits are not breached. Financial, technical, and legal support would be appropriate for instances where hard limits are transgressed. Research is well positioned to further develop robust evidence on critical and relevant risks at scale in the most vulnerable countries and communities, as well as options to reduce barriers and limits to adaptation.

Mechler, R; Singh, C; Ebi, K; Djalante, R; Thomas, A; James, R; Tschakert, P; Wewerinke-Singh, M; Schinko, T; Ley, D; Nalau, J; Bouwer, LM; Huggel, C; Huq, S; Linnerooth-Bayer, J; Surminski, S; Pinho, P; Jones, R; Boyd, E; Revi, A

Loss and Damage and limits to adaptation: recent IPCC insights and implications for climate science and policy

Sustainability Science

https://doi.org/10.1007/s11625-020-00807-9

Climate change scenarios have significant implications for the livelihoods and food security of particular groups in society and will necessitate a range of adaptation actions. While there is a significant literature on the social as well as biophysical factors and limits to adaptation, less is known about the interactions between these, and what such interactions mean for the prospects of achieving sustainable and resilient food systems. This paper is an attempt at addressing this gap by examining changing biophysical and social factors, with specific consideration of vulnerable groups, across four case studies (Ghana, Malawi, Norway and Spain). In each case, future climate change scenarios and associated biophysical limits are mapped onto four key social factors that drive vulnerability and mediate adaptation, namely, scale, history, power and politics, and social differentiation. We then consider what the interaction between biophysical limits and socio-political dynamics means for the options for and limits to future adaptation, and how climate may interact with, and reshape, socio-political elements. We find that biophysical limits and socio-political factors do not operate in isolation, but interact, with dynamic relationships determining the 'space' or set of options for sustainable adaptation. By connecting the perspectives of biophysical and social factors, the study illuminates the risks of unanticipated outcomes that result from the disregard of local contexts in the implementation of adaptation measures. We conclude that a framework focusing on the space for sustainable adaptation conditioned by biophysical and social factors, and their interactions, can help provide evidence on what does and does not constitute sustainable adaptation, and help to counter unhelpful narratives of climate change as a sole or dominant cause of challenges in food systems.

Bezner Kerr, R; Naess, LO; Allen‐O'Neil, B; Totin, E; Nyantakyi‐Frimpong, H; Risvoll, C; Rivera Ferre, MG; López-i-Gelats, F; Eriksen, S

Interplays between changing biophysical and social dynamics under climate change: Implications for limits to sustainable adaptation in food systems

Global Change Biology

https://doi.org/10.1111/gcb.16124

In this paper, we discuss the theoretical relationships among interacting global change risks, valued livelihood goals, and adaptation limits. We build from research on the impacts of multiple and interacting global change risks in lesser-developed countries and seek to understand household adaptation limits in agrarian communities. We ask: What are valued livelihood goals among smallholder farmers in Northwest Costa Rica? How do socio-economic determinants of adaptive capacities determine their ability to meet these goals in the face of the impacts of interacting global change risks? Our data were based on focus groups, interviews, survey responses from 94 smallholder farmers, government statistics, and published literature. We analyzed our data using qualitative content analysis and quantitative logistic regression models. Our analysis showed that farmers perceived rice production as an identity, and that they were being forced to consider limits to their abilities to adapt to maintain that identity. We found that farm size, cattle ownership, years spent farming, and household income variety were determinants of their abilities to remain in rice production while maintaining sufficient levels of livelihood security. We also showed that for those households most vulnerable to water scarcity, their ability to successfully adapt to meet valued livelihood goals is diminished because adaptation to water scarcity increases vulnerability to decreased rice-market access. In this way, they become trapped by the inability to reduce their vulnerability to risks of the interaction between global changes and therefore abandon valued identities and livelihoods.

Warner, BP; Kuzdas, C; Yglesias, MG; Childers, DL

Limits to adaptation to interacting global change risks among smallholder rice farmers in Northwest Costa Rica

Global Environmental Change

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2014.11.002

Increasing environmental disasters are creating significant uncertainty for farm families and their communities across the world. One site critically affected is the Murray-Darling Basin area of Australia, an area known as the food bowl of Australia. Following a lengthy drought at the turn of the century concerns were raised about water quality and river health. This led successive governments to introduce policies to systematically reduce water available for irrigated agriculture. The Murray-Darling Basin Plan was developed by the Commonwealth government and is designed to secure water savings from irrigators and to direct those water savings to the stressed natural environment. This paper focuses on the impact of these changes on irrigation dairy families and their communities in northern Victoria. Using a model designed to test the limits to adaptation, we draw out the constraints, limits and barriers to adaptation for dairy families and their communities coping with reduced water access. This model highlights the types of socially just and fair interventions necessary to assist adaptation and foctises attention on thresholds and traps that may prevent adaptation. The model is relevant to other areas where climate changes and environmental disasters are shaping inevitable change.

Alston, M; Clarke, J; Whittenbury, K

Limits to adaptation: Reducing irrigation water in the Murray-Darling Basin dairy communities

Journal of Rural Studies

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jrurstud.2017.12.026

In this paper, we present the results of a systematic literature review of climate change vulnerability-related research conducted in Bangladesh between 1994 and 2017 in order to identify trends and knowledge gaps. Our results identify interesting evolutions in the temporal and spatial scales of study and the nature of spatial and thematic associations, suggesting important knowledge gaps in the existing literature that likely limit understandings of scale-sensitive climate change impacts. We also observed a temporal mismatch between the published studies and policy-making processes focused on adaptation and mitigation and a bias towards the economic aspects of climate change, with less focus on social and environmental issues. Thematically, the climate change-related scholarship in Bangladesh would benefit from more integrative, cross-theme, and transdisciplinary studies, potentially drawing on the different theoretical constructs of vulnerability and adaptation. Such studies will be needed to better support evidence-based public policy and also to more accurately reflect the diversity of knowledge gaps and challenges concerning climatic stresses in Bangladesh at different scales and in different contexts.

Tuihedur Rahman, HM; Hickey, GM; Ford, JD; Egan, M

Climate change research in Bangladesh: research gaps and implications for adaptation-related decision-making

Regional Environmental Change

https://doi.org/10.1007/s10113-017-1271-9

Society's response to every dimension of global climate change is mediated by culture. We analyse new research across the social sciences to show that climate change threatens cultural dimensions of lives and livelihoods that include the material and lived aspects of culture, identity, community cohesion and sense of place. We find, furthermore, that there are important cultural dimensions to how societies respond and adapt to climate-related risks. We demonstrate how culture mediates changes in the environment and changes in societies, and we elucidate shortcomings in contemporary adaptation policy.

Adger, WN; Barnett, J; Brown, K; Marshall, N; O'brien, K

Cultural dimensions of climate change impacts and adaptation

Nature Climate Change

https://doi.org/10.1038/nclimate1666

This paper reviews the concept of adaptation of human communities to global changes, especially climate change, in the context of adaptive capacity and vulnerability. It focuses on scholarship that contributes to practical implementation of adaptations at the community scale. In numerous social science fields, adaptations are considered as responses to risks associated with the interaction of environmental hazards and human vulnerability or adaptive capacity. In the climate change field, adaptation analyses have been undertaken for several distinct purposes. Impact assessments assume adaptations to estimate damages to longer term climate scenarios with and without adjustments. Evaluations of specified adaptation options aim to identify preferred measures. Vulnerability indices seek to provide relative vulnerability scores for countries, regions or communities. The main purpose of participatory vulnerability assessments is to identify adaptation strategies that are feasible and practical in communities. The distinctive features of adaptation analyses with this purpose are outlined, and common elements of this approach are described. Practical adaptation initiatives tend to focus on risks that are already problematic, climate is considered together with other environmental and social stresses, and adaptations are mostly integrated or mainstreamed into other resource management, disaster preparedness and sustainable development programs.

Smit, B; Wandel, J

Adaptation, adaptive capacity and vulnerability

Global Environmental Change

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2006.03.008

The consequences of climate change and responses to climate change interact with multiple dimensions of human well-being in ways that are emerging or invisible to decision makers. We examine how elements of well-being—health, safety, place, self and belonging—are at risk from climate change. We propose that the material impacts of a changing climate, discourses and information on future and present climate risks, and policy responses to climate change affect all these elements of well-being. We review evidence on the scale and scope of these climate change consequences for well-being and propose policy and research priorities that are oriented towards supporting well-being though a changing climate.

Adger, WN; Barnett, J; Heath, S; Jarillo, S

Climate change affects multiple dimensions of well-being through impacts, information and policy responses

Nature Human Behaviour

https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-022-01467-8

Adaptation pathways have been conventionally viewed as an approach for planning and identifying different adaptation options and the ways in which they can be realized. However, there has been scant consideration of the wide diversity of cultural and social processes which shape how adaptation pathways emerge. We argue that a cultural lens sheds light on differential vulnerability and the processes that enable or hinder adaptation. A cultural lens focuses intrinsically on intersectional categories which can impact the adaptive agency or resilience of individuals, households, and communities. In particular, we need to examine how cultural beliefs, norms, and practices change over time, and are reflected in adaptation pathways since livelihoods do not remain the same over the life course. Additionally, taking a broader perspective by incorporating concepts from cognitive anthropology helps us understand motivations and choices which influence adaptation pathways.

Marks, D; Bayrak, MM; Jahangir, S; Henig, D; Bailey, A

Towards a cultural lens for adaptation pathways to climate change

Regional Environmental Change

https://doi.org/10.1007/s10113-022-01884-5

The dangers that future climate change poses to physical, biological, and economic systems are accounted for in analyses of risk and increasingly figure in decision-making about responses to climate change. Yet the potential cultural and social impacts of climate change have scarcely been considered. In this article we bring the risks climate change poses to cultures and social systems into consideration through a focus on places—those local material and symbolic contexts that give meaning and value to peoples' lives. By way of examples, the article reviews evidence on the observed and projected impacts of climate change on the Arctic and Pacific island atoll nations. It shows that impacts may result in the loss of many unique natural and cultural components of these places. We then argue that the risk of irreversible loss of places needs to be factored into decision-making on climate change. The article then suggests ways forward in decision-making that recognizes these non-market and non-instrumental metrics of risk, based on principles of justice and recognition of individual and community identity.

Adger, WN; Barnett, J; Chapin III, FS; Ellemor, H

This must be the place: underrepresentation of identity and meaning in climate change decision-making

Global Environmental Politics

https://doi.org/10.1162/GLEP_a_00051

Climate change presents a significant planning challenge for water management agencies in the western United States. Changing precipitation and temperature patterns will disrupt their supply and extensive distribution systems over the coming decades, but the precise timing and extent of these impacts remain deeply uncertain, complicating decisions on needed investments in infrastructure and other system improvements. Adaptive strategies represent an obvious solution in principle, but are often difficult to develop and implement in practice. This paper describes work helping the Inland Empire Utilities Agency (IEUA) explicitly develop adaptive policies to respond to climate change and integrating these policies into the organizations' long-range planning processes. The analysis employs Robust Decision Making (RDM), a quantitative decision- analytic approach for supporting decisions under conditions of deep uncertainty. RDM studies use simulation models to assess the performance of agency plans over thousands of plausible futures, use statistical “scenario discovery” algorithms to concisely summarize those futures where the plans fail to perform adequately, and use these resulting scenarios to help decisionmakers understand the vulnerabilities of their plans and assess the options for ameliorating these vulnerabilities. This paper demonstrates the particular value of RDM in helping decisionmakers to design and evaluate adaptive strategies. For IEUA, the RDM analysis suggests the agency's current plan could perform poorly and lead to high shortage and water provisioning costs under conditions of: (1) large declines in precipitation, (2) larger-than-expected impacts of climate change on the availability of imported supplies, and (3) reductions in percolation of precipitation into the region's groundwater basin. Including adaptivity in the current plan eliminates 72% of the high-cost outcomes. Accelerating efforts in expanding the size of one of the agency's groundwater banking programs and implementing its recycling program, while monitoring the region's supply and demand balance and making additional investments in efficiency and storm-water capture if shortages are projected provides one promising robust adaptive strategy — it eliminates more than 80% of the initially-identified high-cost outcomes.

Lempert, RJ; Groves, DG

Identifying and evaluating robust adaptive policy responses to climate change for water management agencies in the American west

Technological Forecasting and Social Change

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.techfore.2010.04.007

Knowledge about regional and local climate change can inform climate risk assessments and adaptation decisions. However, estimates of future precipitation change at the regional and local level are deeply uncertain for many parts of the world. A novel methodology was developed that uses climate processes and expert elicitation to build narratives of future regional precipitation change. The narratives qualitatively describe physically plausible evolutions of future regional climate substantiated by climate processes. This method is applied to the Indian Summer Monsoon, focusing on the Cauvery River Basin in Karnataka, Southern India. Six climate narratives are constructed as a function of two drivers prioritised by the experts: moisture availability over the Arabian Sea and strength of the low-level westerly flow. The narratives describe how future precipitation could change until the 2050s and which climate processes and anthropogenic factors could influence this evolution. Analysis using observed (Global Precipitation Climatology Centre) and re-analysis (ERA20 and Interim) data shows the experts' judgement on key drivers fits well with empirical relationships. The expert elicited drivers explain 70% of the variance in peak monsoon precipitation (July and August) over the Western Ghats between 1979−2013 (using ERA Interim). The study shows that through expert elicitation, process-based narratives enable climate scientists to characterise and communicate elements of deep uncertainty in future precipitation change. Expert judgment techniques need be more widely applied to characterise uncertainty in regional and local climate change.

Dessai, S; Bhave, A; Birch, C; Conway, D; Garcia-Carreras, L; Gosling, JP; Mittal, N; Stainforth, D

Building narratives to characterise uncertainty in regional climate change through expert elicitation

Environmental Research Letters

https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/aabcdd

Many European countries have developed National Adaptation Strategies (NAS) to guide adaptation to the expected impacts of climate change. There is a need for more structured communication of the uncertainties related to future climate and its impacts so that adaptation actions can be planned and implemented effectively and efficiently. We develop a novel uncertainty assessment framework for comparing approaches to the inclusion and communication of physical science uncertainty, and use it to analyse ten European NAS. The framework is based on but modifies and integrates the notion of the “cascade of uncertainties” and the NUSAP (Numeral Unit Spread Assessment Pedigree) methodology to include the overarching assessment categories of Numerical Value, Spread, Depth and Substantiation. Our assessment indicates that there are marked differences between the NAS in terms of inclusion and communication of physical science uncertainty. We find that there is a bias towards the communication of quantitative uncertainties as opposed to qualitative uncertainties. Through the examination of the English and German NAS, we find that similar stages of development in adaptation policy planning can nevertheless result in differences in handling physical science uncertainty. We propose that the degree of transparency and openness on physical science uncertainty is linked to the wider socio-political context within which the NAS are framed. Our methodology can help raise awareness among NAS users about the explicit and embedded information on physical science uncertainty within the existing NAS and would help to design more structured uncertainty communication in new or revised NAS.

Lorenz, S; Dessai, S; Paavola, J; Forster, PM

The communication of physical science uncertainty in European National Adaptation Strategies

Climatic Change

https://doi.org/10.1007/s10584-013-0809-1

There is increasing interest in long-term plans that can adapt to changing situations under conditions of deep uncertainty. We argue that a sustainable plan should not only achieve economic, environmental, and social objectives, but should be robust and able to be adapted over time to (unforeseen) future conditions. Large numbers of papers dealing with robustness and adaptive plans have begun to appear, but the literature is fragmented. The papers appear in disparate journals, and deal with a wide variety of policy domains. This paper (1) describes and compares a family of related conceptual approaches to designing a sustainable plan, and (2) describes several computational tools supporting these approaches. The conceptual approaches all have their roots in an approach to long-term planning called Assumption-Based Planning. Guiding principles for the design of a sustainable adaptive plan are: explore a wide variety of relevant uncertainties, connect short-term targets to long-term goals over time, commit to short-term actions while keeping options open, and continuously monitor the world and take actions if necessary. A key computational tool across the conceptual approaches is a fast, simple (policy analysis) model that is used to make large numbers of runs, in order to explore the full range of uncertainties and to identify situations in which the plan would fail.

Walker, WE; Haasnoot, M; Kwakkel, JH

Adapt or perish: a review of planning approaches for adaptation under deep uncertainty

Sustainability

https://doi.org/10.3390/su5030955

This paper explores Inuit philosophies about the future, long-term planning, and prediction and investigates the ways that these contrast with Western ideas. By describing how Inuit deal with the inherent uncertainty of the Arctic environment, and how this leads to distinct attitudes towards managing the future and its potential risks, the argument is made that these philosophies are a highly effective method of knowing the Arctic environment. However, the strengths of this approach may at times be obscured by a current desire to show that Inuit predict and plan in the same way as do Western scientists. In fact, such attempts can delegitimize Inuit ways of knowing the future, by effectively setting Western science as a benchmark by which Inuit knowledge is judged, thus reducing the likelihood of effective collaboration between Inuit and Western researchers in environmental management.

Bates, P

Inuit and scientific philosophies about planning, prediction, and uncertainty

Arctic Anthropology

https://doi.org/10.1353/arc.2011.0065

The capacity to adapt is a critical element of the process of adaptation: it is the vector of resources that represent the asset base from which adaptation actions can be made. Adaptive capacity can in theory be identified and measured at various scales, from the individual to the nation. The assessment of uncertainty within such measures comes from the contested knowledge domain and theories surrounding the nature of the determinants of adaptive capacity and the human action of adaptation. While generic adaptive capacity at the national level, for example, is often postulated as being dependent on health, governance and political rights, and literacy, and economic well-being, the determinants of these variables at national levels are not widely understood. We outline the nature of this uncertainty for the major elements of adaptive capacity and illustrate these issues with the example of a social vulnerability index for countries in Africa.

Adger, WN; Vincent, K

Uncertainty in adaptive capacity

Comptes Rendus Geoscience

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.crte.2004.11.004

‘Resilience’ has risen to prominence across a range of academic disciplines and political discourses. Situating resilience theories in historical context the paper argues that the resilience discourse of complex adaptive systems, for all its utility as a means for conceptualising and managing change, is allied with contemporary governmental discourses that responsibilise risk away from the state and on to individuals and institutions. Further, in arguing that resilience theories originate in two distinct epistemological communities (natural and social science) in its mobilisation as a ‘boundary object’ resilience naturalises an ontology of ‘the system’. Resilience approaches increasingly structure, not only academic, but also government policy discourses, with each influencing the development of the other. It is argued that by mobilising ‘the system’ as the metaconcept for capturing socio-natural and socio-economic relations resilience theories naturalise and reify two abstractions: firstly, the system itself – enrolling citizens into practices that give it meaning and presence; secondly, the naturalisation of shocks to the system, locating them in a post-political space where the only certainty is uncertainty. With reference to an emerging governmentality through resilience, this paper argues for a critical interrogation of plural resilience theories and wonders at their emancipatory possibilities.

Welsh, M

Resilience and responsibility: governing uncertainty in a complex world

The Geographical Journal

https://doi.org/10.1111/geoj.12012

Environmental change, in particular as caused or aggravated by climate change, and its socioeconomic consequences inflict considerable risks on people, especially on poor people who depend very directly on their natural environment for their livelihoods. In this paper, we analyse how such changes affect the people of the village of Toineke in West Timor (Indonesia), which risks the changes involve, and how people cope with and adapt to these risks. In doing so, we refer to concepts and aspects put forward in Ulrich Beck's theory of risk societies, including uncertainty, lack of safety and insecurity as different categories of risk. Based on our analysis, we discuss which role knowledge, in connection with other forms of capital, plays in Toineke in living with and managing the consequences of climatic and environmental change.

Hornidge, AK; Scholtes, F

Climate change and everyday life in Toineke village, West Timor: uncertainties, knowledge and adaptation

Sociologus

https://doi.org/10.3790/soc.61.2.151

This paper explores small-scale farmers’ cultural beliefs about the causes of drought events and the reasoning behind their beliefs. Cultural beliefs vary across countries, regions, communities, and social groups; this paper takes the case of farmers from Gaza Province in southern Mozambique as its focus. Findings show that the farmers have a limited knowledge and understanding of the scientific explanation about drought. Thus, farmers’ beliefs about the causes of drought are strongly based on the indigenous (the power of spirits) and Christian philosophies that attribute drought to supernatural forces, such as ancestors or God, and as a punishment for (some unknown) wrongdoings. Farmers have a distinct and under-explored repertoire of possible wrongdoings to justify the punishments driven by those cultural beliefs. Some of their reasoning is static, while some is mutable, and is based on their observation and perception of the negative, unexpected, or harmful recent or current events which happen in their surrounding environment, and which they believe could be avoided or prevented. Farmers’ beliefs about drought causes, and their underlying reasoning for those beliefs, are what will primarily influence their perception of their own capacity to adapt, their motivation to respond, and their behavioral responses. Yet, their social groups exert a great influence on their choices of response. The paper concludes that more context-specific investigations into the socio-psychological nature of farmers’ beliefs are required prior to interventions in order to better help farmers to respond to future drought risks.

Salite, D

Explaining the uncertainty: understanding small-scale farmers’ cultural beliefs and reasoning of drought causes in Gaza Province, Southern Mozambique

Agriculture and Human Values

https://doi.org/10.1007/s10460-019-09928-z

Uncertainties in the human dimensions of global change deeply affect the assessment and responses to climate change impacts such as sea-level rise (SLR). This paper explores the uncertainties in the assessment process and in state-level policy and management responses of three US states to SLR. The findings reveal important political, economic, managerial, and social factors that enable or constrain SLR responses; question disasters as policy windows; and uncover new policy opportunities in the history of state coastal policies. Results suggest that a more realistic, and maybe more useful picture of climate change impacts will emerge if assessments take more seriously the locally embedded realities and constraints that affect individual decision-makers’ and communal responses to climate change.

Moser, SC

Impact assessments and policy responses to sea-level rise in three US states: an exploration of human-dimension uncertainties

Global Environmental Change

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2005.08.002

Adapting to climate change is necessary to ensure that the impacts will not overwhelm societies and ecosystems around the world. But planning adaptation is an exercise in uncertainty, and built on imperfect information, many adaptation strategies fail. Some go even further, creating conditions that actually worsen the situation; this is called maladaptation. Aside from wasting time and money, maladaptation is a process through which people become even more vulnerable to climate change. Poor planning is the primary cause of maladaptation, yet the diverse manifestations are complex, and identifying maladaptation in advance with certainty is difficult. Nevertheless, there is now sufficient experience to give an indication of how maladaptation can take place, the contexts that may be more prone to such an outcome, and the design flaws in strategies that need to be avoided. Until adaptation projects directly address the drivers of vulnerability, however, maladaptation will continue to be a risk.

Schipper, ELF

Maladaptation: when adaptation to climate change goes very wrong

One Earth

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.oneear.2020.09.014

This paper reviews the current theoretical scholarship on maladaptation and provides some specific case studies—in the Maldives, Ethiopia, South Africa, and Bangladesh—to advance the field by offering an improved conceptual understanding and more practice-oriented insights. It notably highlights four main dimensions to assess the risk of maladaptation, that is, process, multiple drivers, temporal scales, and spatial scales. It also describes three examples of frameworks—the Pathways, the Precautionary, and the Assessment frameworks—that can help capture the risk of maladaptation on the ground. Both these conceptual and practical developments support the need for putting the risk of maladaptation at the top of the planning agenda. The paper argues that starting with the intention to avoid mistakes and not lock-in detrimental effects of adaptation-labeled initiatives is a first, key step to the wider process of adapting to climate variability and change. It thus advocates for the anticipation of the risk of maladaptation to become a priority for decision makers and stakeholders at large, from the international to the local levels. Such an ex ante approach, however, supposes to get a clearer understanding of what maladaptation is. Ultimately, the paper affirms that a challenge for future research consists in developing context-specific guidelines that will allow funding bodies to make the best decisions to support adaptation (i.e., by better capturing the risk of maladaptation) and practitioners to design adaptation initiatives with a low risk of maladaptation.

Magnan, AK; Schipper, ELF; Burkett, M; Bharwani, S; Burton, I; Eriksen, S; Gemenne, F; Schaar, J; Ziervogel, G

Addressing the risk of maladaptation to climate change

Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Climate Change

https://doi.org/10.1002/wcc.409

Implementation of national adaptation policy is advancing. There also appears to be a shift, albeit slow, from monitoring of implementation to evaluation of outcomes of the policy. However, there is an absence of an agreed definition or metrics to indicate when national level implementation fails or goes wrong. The concept of maladaptation remains elusively defined in the adaptation policy sphere but is often evoked in national adaptation plans. Empirical research on maladaptation related to national adaptation policies is lacking, despite claims of it increasingly taking place. This review discusses whether maladaptation should be operationalised as a concept in national adaptation policy, how it would be done and what could it take to make it happen. The paper argues that unless failure of adaptation policy is considered, understanding the adaptation gap, for example, becomes even more challenging.

Juhola, S; Käyhkö, J

Maladaptation as a concept and a metric in national adaptation policy -- Should we, would we, could we?

PLOS Climate

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pclm.0000213

The recent publication of the Physical Science Basis volume of IPCC’s Fifth Assessment Report reaffirms an already known conclusion: even drastic reductions of global greenhouse gas emissions will be insufficient to avoid some of the impacts of climate change, and is becoming increasingly clear that the temperature increase by the end of the century is likely to exceed the official target of +2°C. Urgent efforts are thus more than ever needed to support socio-ecological systems threatened by climate change, but how to make adaptation happen on the ground remains vague. Consequently, there is a real risk that climate funding may support initiatives that are actually harmful for the socio-ecological systems, i.e. that foster adaptation in the short-term but insidiously affect systems’ long-term vulnerability and/or adaptive capacity to climate change. This generally defines “maladaptation”, and this paper affirms that avoiding maladaptation is a first key concrete step towards adaptation in a broader sense. Focusing on coastal areas at a local scale and with the aim of providing insights to help avoiding maladaptation to climate change on the ground, this paper develops eleven practice-oriented guidelines that address the environmental, sociocultural and economic dimensions of adaptation initiatives (policies, plans, projects). Based upon this, it affirms that the more guidelines an initiative addresses, the lower will be the risk of maladaptation. Together, these guidelines and this assumption constitute the “Assessment framework” for approaching maladaptation to climate change at a local level.

Magnan, A

Avoiding maladaptation to climate change: towards guiding principles

Perspectives Integrating Environment and Society

https://journals.openedition.org/sapiens/1680

An emerging component of the adaptation discourse, embracing theory, practice and review, is that of the negative assessment of adaptation, namely, maladaptation. Political theories and concepts have been applied as one of these assessment tools, giving rise to a political critique of maladaptation. Such a critique contrasts with the more conventional scientific and technical assessments of adaptation policies, programs and practices. Key political themes in studies of maladaptation include resource management and allocations, decision making processes, equity and fairness, gender, power and influence, and Nature and ecology. Within the scholarship on the politics of maladaptation, overlapping frameworks can be identified. Critiques of adaptation have been applied to the preconditions of adaptation, adaptation decision making processes and institutions, and to adaptation outcomes. There are a number of conceptual challenges in undertaking political analyses of adaptation. In this article, we outline the origins of the adaptation and maladaptation concepts, we describe the key political issues, we identify the application of politics in the maladaptation discourse and identify the major political perspectives. Finally, we draw conclusions on the state of the maladaptation discourse.

Glover, L; Granberg, M

The politics of maladaptation

Climate

https://doi.org/10.3390/cli9050069

Some degree of climate change is now inevitable, and so therefore is the need for responses to avoid its likely impacts. Yet adaptation to climate change is no easy matter: decisions may fail to meet their objectives, and they may even increase vulnerability. This problem of increasing risks from adaptation is often termed ‘maladaptation’. We define and explain five key dimensions of maladaptation, which we then ground with reference to the example of responses to water stress in Melbourne. We define five types of maladaptation to climate change, and explain these with reference to the responses to water stress in Melbourne. Adaptation strategies may increase the vulnerability of other systems, sectors, or groups if they increase emissions of greenhouse gases, disproportionately burden the most vulnerable, have high opportunity costs, reduce incentives to adapt, or set paths that limit the choices available to future generations. These five pathways to maladaptation offer a basis by which adaptation decisions can be screened for their possible adverse effects. Each implies a question and a line of investigation.

Barnett, J; O'Neill, S

Maladaptation

Global Environmental Change

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2009.11.004

Climate change threatens human wellbeing and adaptation is essential. To-date, little research has examined connections between incremental and transformative adaptation. We address this gap using two multi-functional flood defence projects in Clontarf, a community in Dublin, Ireland, one of which represents transformative and the other incremental adaptation. Using a repeated study, we ask (i) does the importance of place-related values differ depending on whether adaptation is incremental or transformative, and (ii) what role does trust in governance play in incremental adaptation when transformation fails? Surveys were administered in Clontarf in 2014 (n = 280) after community resistance to transformative flood defences. A follow-up study using an identical survey was undertaken to evaluate separate incremental flood defences in 2016 (n = 242). Results highlight several important findings. First, both adaptation interventions show repeated potential threats to place from perceived weak governance rather than from disruptive place change caused by climate change. Second, where place attachment is strong, communities may repeatedly resist potential threats to place by challenging poor governance. However, this inadvertently threatens place disruption from climate change e.g., extreme climatic events. This could cause maladaptation, tying future decisions to past actions and failing to consider alternative transformative adaptation pathways. Finally, community discussions on transformative pathways and avoiding maladaptation risks are crucial for successful adaptation. This includes recognising trade-offs between place disruption threats from proposed adaptation strategies and climate change. Governance processes may subsequently need to transform and incorporate learnings or risk repeated resistance to adaptation previously considered rational. Many of these issues are likely to be encountered in all regions globally and across multiple adaptation sectors. Findings therefore provide important evidence to improve adaptation outcomes more generally.

Clarke, D; Murphy, C

Incremental adaptation when transformation fails: The importance of place-based values and trust in governance in avoiding maladaptation

Journal of Environmental Psychology

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jenvp.2023.102037

Maladaptation to climate change is often portrayed as arising from the unjust exclusion of vulnerable people. In turn, analysts have proposed knowledge co-production with marginalized groups as a form of transformative climate justice. This paper argues instead that maladaptation arises from a much deeper exclusion based upon the projection of inappropriate understandings of risk and social identity that are treated as unquestioned circumstances of justice. Drawing on social studies of science, the paper argues that the focus on co-production as an intentional act of inclusion needs to be considered alongside “deep” or “reflexive” co-production, which instead refers to the non-cognitive and unavoidable simultaneous generation of knowledge and social order. These processes have linked visions of planetary justice with an understanding of climate risk based on global atmospheric change, and an assumption that community forms an antidote to individualism. The paper uses a discussion of adaptation in western Nepal to illustrate how such deep forms of co-production have significantly reduced understandings of “what” adaptation is for, and “who” is included. Maladaptation, therefore, is not simply unjust implementations of an essentially fair model of adaptation, but also the allocation of exclusionary visions of what and for whom adaptation is for. Debates about transformative climate justice therefore need to understand how their critiques of classical liberal justice generate exclusions of their own, and to engage vulnerable people in reframing, rather than just receiving, circumstances of justice. There is also a need to examine how these circumstances remain unchallenged within environmental science and policy.

Forsyth, T; McDermott, CL

When climate justice goes wrong: maladaptation and deep co-production in transformative environmental science and policy

Political Geography

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.polgeo.2022.102691

Transformative adaptation will be increasingly important to effectively address the impacts of climate change and other global drivers on social-ecological systems. Enabling transformative adaptation requires new ways to evaluate and adaptively manage trade-offs between maintaining desirable aspects of current social-ecological systems and adapting to major biophysical changes to those systems. We outline such an approach, based on three elements developed by the Transformative Adaptation Research Alliance (TARA): (1) the benefits of adaptation services; that sub-set of ecosystem services that help people adapt to environmental change; (2) The values-rules-knowledge perspective (vrk) for identifying those aspects of societal decision-making contexts that enable or constrain adaptation and (3) the adaptation pathways approach for implementing adaptation, that builds on and integrates adaptation services and the vrk perspective. Together, these elements provide a future-oriented approach to evaluation and use of ecosystem services, a dynamic, grounded understanding of governance and decision-making and a logical, sequential approach that connects decisions over time. The TARA approach represents a means for achieving changes in institutions and governance needed to support transformative adaptation.

Colloff, M. J; Martín-López, B; Lavorel, S; Locatelli, B; Gorddard, R; Longaretti, PY; Walters, G; van Kerkhoff, L; Wyborn, C; Coreau, A; Wise, RM; Dunlop, M; Degeorges, P; Grantham, H; Overton, IC; Williams, RD; Doherty, MD; Capon, T; Sanderson, T; Murphy, HT

An integrative research framework for enabling transformative adaptation

Environmental Science & Policy

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envsci.2016.11.007

Building societal resilience to climate change depends on increased adaptation. In this Review of scholarship on behavioural adaptation, we find that most empirical studies focus on the affective and cognitive drivers of behaviours with largely private benefits. Few examine behaviours with collective benefits or explore the moderating role of social factors on affective and cognitive cues. We point to cultural evolution and complex adaptive systems as frameworks that can improve our understanding of behaviours that lead to greater societal resilience in the long term. Integrating such research traditions with the socio-psychological perspectives that dominate the literature will ensure that future studies better distinguish the drivers of incremental coping from transformative adaptation.

Wilson, RS; Herziger, A; Hamilton, M; Brooks, JS

From incremental to transformative adaptation in individual responses to climate-exacerbated hazards

Nature Climate Change

https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-020-0691-6

In climate change discourse the concept of anticipatory adaptation has emerged to refer to proactive strategies for preparing communities for future change. This paper makes a proposal for what might be called anticipatory history. At designated heritage sites prevailing narratives tend to project long-term conservation indefinitely forward into the future. These narrative formulations fall short when confronted with the impending transformation, or even disappearance, of landscapes and artefacts of cultural heritage – a process that is likely to become increasingly common with the acceleration of environmental change in coastal and other contexts. Might it be possible to experiment with other ways of storying landscape, framing histories around movement rather than stasis, and drawing connections between past dynamism and future process? At the core of this paper is an experimental narration of the history of a Cornish harbour. The narrative presents a reverse chronology of moments gleaned from diverse sources ranging over three centuries, looking to a fractured landscape past to find resources for encountering a future unmaking.

DeSilvey, C

Making sense of transience: an anticipatory history

Cultural Geographies

https://doi.org/10.1177/1474474010397599

This progress report considers the need for developing a critical body of research on deliberate transformation as a response to global environmental change. Although there is a rapidly growing literature on adaptation to environmental change, including both incremental and transformational adaptation, this often focuses on accommodating change, rather than contesting it and creating alternatives. Given increasing calls from scientists and activists for transformative actions to avoid dangerous changes in the earth system, and the likelihood that ‘urgent’ solutions will be imposed by various interests, many new and important questions are emerging about individual and collective capacities to deliberately transform systems and structures in a manner that is both ethical and sustainable. This presents a transformative challenge to global change science itself that calls for new approaches to transdisciplinary research.

O'Brien, K

Global environmental change II: from adaptation to deliberate transformation

Progress in human geography

https://doi.org/10.1177/0309132511425767

This paper explores place disruption, where transformative adaptation was proposed for flood risk management, by examining: a) the relationships between place attachment, place-related symbolic meanings, place-protective interpretative responses and attitudinal responses, and b) evaluation of governance processes. Questionnaires were administered to residents in Clontarf, County Dublin, Ireland in 2014 (n = 280) in the aftermath of community resistance to perceived transformative flood defences. Results highlight the dilemmas for individuals who recognise adaptation as necessary but who ascribe significant importance to valued places. Contrary to previous studies, our analysis shows place attachment to be strongest in individuals who perceive governance processes as inadequate, and finds that neither flood experience nor flood risk affect strength of place attachment and support for flood defences. We suggest that where transformative adaptation disrupts place and threatens place attachment, considering the views of both those affected and unaffected by hazardous events is paramount.

Clarke, D; Murphy, C; Lorenzoni, I

Place attachment, disruption and transformative adaptation

Journal of Environmental Psychology

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jenvp.2017.12.006

Countries across the world aspire towards climate resilient sustainable development. The interacting processes of climate change, land change, and unprecedented social and technological change pose significant obstacles to these aspirations. The pace, intensity, and scale of these sizeable risks and vulnerabilities affect the central issues in sustainable development: how and where people live and work, access to essential resources and ecosystem services needed to sustain people in given locations, and the social and economic means to improve human wellbeing in the face of disruptions. This paper addresses the question: What are the characteristics of transformational adaptation and development in the context of profound changes in land and climate? To explore this question, this paper contains four case studies: managing storm water runoff related to the conversion of rural land to urban land in Indonesia; using a basket of interventions to manage social impacts of flooding in Nepal; combining a national glacier protection law with water rights management in Argentina; and community-based relocation in response to permafrost thaw and coastal erosion in Alaska. These case studies contribute to understanding characteristics of adaptation which is commensurate to sizeable risks and vulnerabilities to society in changing climate and land systems. Transformational adaptation is often perceived as a major large-scale intervention. In practice, the case studies in this article reveal that transformational adaptation is more likely to involve a bundle of adaptation interventions that are aimed at flexibly adjusting to change rather than reinforcing the status quo in ways of doing things. As a global mosaic, transformational change at a grand scale will occur through an inestimable number of smaller steps to adjust the central elements of human systems proportionate to the changes in climate and land systems. Understanding the characteristics of transformational adaptation will be essential to design and implement adaptation that keeps society in step with reconfiguring climate and land systems as they depart from current states.

Warner, K; Zommers, Z; Wreford, A; Hurlbert, M; Viner, D; Scantlan, J; Halsey, K; Halsey K; Tamang, C

Characteristics of Transformational Adaptation in Climate-Land-Society Interactions

Sustainability

https://doi.org/10.3390/su11020356

Global drylands comprise over 40% of the earth’s land surface, support millions of pastoralists and account for half of the world’s livestock. Climate change and socio-economic drivers are rapidly altering dryland social-ecological systems, with the potential to increase vulnerability. This article describes forces of change in drylands and the social changes observed in pastoralist dryland systems, with a focus on Africa. The observed changes point to changes in values, social/gender relations, livelihoods and institutions, all fundamental elements of transformational adaptation. The paper concludes with a discussion of transformational adaptation research and its implications for policy.

Galvin, K. A

Transformational adaptation in drylands

Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cosust.2021.03.003

Adaptation is a process of deliberate change in anticipation of or in reaction to external stimuli and stress. The dominant research tradition on adaptation to environmental change primarily takes an actor-centered view, focusing on the agency of social actors to respond to specific environmental stimuli and emphasizing the reduction of vulnerabilities. The resilience approach is systems orientated, takes a more dynamic view, and sees adaptive capacity as a core feature of resilient social-ecological systems. The two approaches converge in identifying necessary components of adaptation. We argue that resilience provides a useful framework to analyze adaptation processes and to identify appropriate policy responses. We distinguish between incremental adjustments and transformative action and demonstrate that the sources of resilience for taking adaptive action are common across scales. These are the inherent system characteristics that absorb perturbations without losing function, networks and social capital that allow autonomous action, and resources that promote institutional learning.

Nelson, DR; Adger, WN; Brown, K

Adaptation to environmental change: contributions of a resilience framework

Annual Review of Environment and Resources

https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.energy.32.051807.090348

The 2015 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Paris (COP21) highlighted the importance of cities to climate action, as well as the unjust burdens borne by the world's most disadvantaged peoples in addressing climate impacts. Few studies have documented the barriers to redressing the drivers of social vulnerability as part of urban local climate change adaptation efforts, or evaluated how emerging adaptation plans impact marginalized groups. Here, we present a roadmap to reorient research on the social dimensions of urban climate adaptation around four issues of equity and justice: (1) broadening participation in adaptation planning; (2) expanding adaptation to rapidly growing cities and those with low financial or institutional capacity; (3) adopting a multilevel and multi-scalar approach to adaptation planning; and (4) integrating justice into infrastructure and urban design processes. Responding to these empirical and theoretical research needs is the first step towards identifying pathways to more transformative adaptation policies.

Roadmap towards justice in urban climate adaptation research

https://doi.org/10.1038/nclimate2841

Critical scholarship on the intersection of development pathways and climate change responses highlights the roles of power, agency, social difference, intersecting inequalities, and social justice in shaping people’s resilience in a rapidly transforming world. Yet, how to precisely increase the spaces in which people experiencing marginalisation can address power asymmetries and strengthen their resilience, particularly from a methodological perspective, remains poorly understood. Here, we build on recent insights into political capabilities and their relevance for equitable resilience practice to assess the role research methods play in not only locating political capabilities but also enhancing them in the context of climate resilience. We present the findings from an in-depth analysis of 57 articles, out of a larger set of 200+ papers, that have employed co-learning/cooperative inquiries, participatory action research, participatory methods, workshops, and/or interviews combined with other approaches as most engaging and potentially empowering methods. Methodological insights through this analysis allow us to examine if and how resilience-in-the-making materialises across uneven power relations and often flawed decision-making processes. We show the pervasiveness of power differentials, even in research settings designed to be inclusive, and how disempowering processes in adaptation, mitigation, disaster management, and social transformation further marginalise already disadvantaged actors. At the same time, we illustrate the transformative role of alliances, resistance, shared learning, and sustaining inclusive approaches. Such nuanced insights into best processes as well as detrimental pitfalls are essential for development scholars and practitioners to help anchor deliberative resilience practice in the everyday lives of disadvantaged populations and foster political capabilities for more just climate action and policy.

Tschakert, P; Parsons, M; Atkins, E; Garcia, A; Godden, N; Gonda, N; Henrique, Karen P; Sallu, S; Steen, K; Ziervogel, G

Methodological lessons for negotiating power, political capabilities, and resilience in research on climate change responses

World Development

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.worlddev.2023.106247

Resilience building has become a growing policy agenda, particularly for urban risk management. While much of the resilience agenda has been shaped by policies and discourses from the global North, its applicability for cities of the global South, particularly African cities, has not been sufficiently assessed. Focusing on rights of urban citizens as the object to be made resilient, rather than physical and ecological infrastructures, may help to address many of the root causes that characterize the unacceptable risks that urban residents face on a daily basis. Linked to this idea, we discuss four entry points for grounding a rights and justice orientation for urban resilience. First, notions of resilience must move away from narrow, financially oriented risk analyses. Second, opportunities must be created for “negotiated resilience”, to allow for attention to processes that support these goals, as well as for the integration of diverse interests. Third, achieving resilience in ways that do justice to the local realities of diverse urban contexts necessitates taking into account endogenous, locally situated processes, knowledges and norms. And finally, urban resilience needs to be placed within the context of global systems, providing an opportunity for African contributions to help reimagine the role that cities might play in these global financial, political and science processes.

Ziervogel, G; Pelling, M; Cartwright, A; Chu, E; Deshpande, T; Harris, L; Hyams, K; Kaunda, J; Klaus, B; Michael, K; Pasquini, L; Pharoah, R; Rodina, L; Scott, D; Zweig, P

Inserting rights and justice into urban resilience: a focus on everyday risk

Environment and Urbanization

https://doi.org/10.1177/0956247816686905

What would abolitionism mean for climate justice? “Resilience” is proposed by experts as a solution to climate change vulnerability. But this prescription tends to focus on adaptation to future external threats, subtly validating embedded processes of racial capitalism that have historically dehumanised and endangered residents and their environments in the first place. This article focuses on majority Black areas said to be vulnerable to extreme weather events and targeted for expert-driven resilience enhancements in America's capital city, Washington, DC. Drawing on key insights from Black radical, feminist, and antiracist humanist thought, we reimagine resilience through an abolitionist framework. Using archival analysis, oral histories, a neighbourhood-level survey, and interviews conducted between 2015 and 2018, we argue that abolitionist climate justice entails a centring of DC's historical environmental and housing-related racisms, the intersectional drivers of precarity and trauma experienced by residents beyond those narrowly associated with “climate”; and an ethics of care and healing practiced by those deemed most at risk to climate change.

Ranganathan, M; Bratman, E

From Urban Resilience to Abolitionist Climate Justice in Washington, DC

Antipode

https://doi.org/10.1111/anti.12555

In September, the United Nations will set out a global agenda for helping communities adapt to climate change through the framework of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). As nations draw up their strategies, we call on them to put equity first. Poor people face a double burden of inequality — from uneven development and climate change. In Mozambique, for example, two-thirds of the population lives in extreme poverty, on less than US$1.9 per day. In March, the nation was hit by Cyclone Idai, followed by Cyclone Kenneth in April. Idai alone killed 1,000 people and left 3 million in need of help. Most were in poor, isolated rural communities and coastal settlements that were cut off from emergency responses. People on extremely low incomes often live along coasts and riversides that are prone to flooding, and in other exposed areas. In Nigeria, the poorest 20% are 50% more likely to lose their lives, assets, livelihoods or health in a flood than the average Nigerian. They are also 130% more likely to be affected by a drought, and 80% more likely to be affected by a heatwave.

Pelling, M; Garschagen, M

Put equity first in climate adaptation

Nature

https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-019-01497-9

The measures implemented to adapt to climate change are primarily designed to address the tangible, biophysical impacts of climate change in a given geographic area. They rarely consider the wider social implications of climate change, nor the politics of adaptation planning and its outcomes. Given the necessity of significant investment in adaptation over years to come, adaptation planning and implementation will need to place greater concern on justice-sensitive approaches to avoid exacerbating existing vulnerabilities and creating maladaptive and conflicting outcomes. Building on recent calls for more just and transformative adaptation planning, this paper offers a flexible analytical framework for integrating theories of justice and transformation into research on climate change adaptation. We discuss adaptation planning as an inherently normative and political process linked to issues pertaining to recognition justice as well as distributional and procedural aspects of justice. The paper aims to contribute to the growing discussion on just adaptation by intersecting theoretical justice dimensions with spatial, temporal and socio-political challenges and choices that arise as part of adaptation planning processes. A focus on justice-sensitive adaptation planning not only provides opportunities for examining spatial as well as temporal justice issues in relation to planning and decision-making processes. It also paves the way for a more critical approach to adaptation planning that acknowledges the need for institutional restructuring and offers steps towards alternative futures under climate change conditions.

Fünfgeld, H; Schmid, B

Justice in climate change adaptation planning: conceptual perspectives on emergent praxis

Geographica Helvetica

https://doi.org/10.5194/gh-75-437-2020

It may be too late to achieve environmental justice for some indigenous peoples, and other groups, in terms of avoiding dangerous climate change. People in the indigenous climate justice movement agree resolutely on the urgency of action to stop dangerous climate change. However, the qualities of relationships connecting indigenous peoples with other societies' governments, nongovernmental organizations, and corporations are not conducive to coordinated action that would avoid further injustice against indigenous peoples in the process of responding to climate change. The required qualities include, among others, consent, trust, accountability, and reciprocity. Indigenous traditions of climate change view the very topic of climate change as connected to these qualities, which are sometimes referred to as kin relationships. The entwinement of colonialism, capitalism, and industrialization failed to affirm or establish these qualities or kinship relationships across societies. While qualities like consent or reciprocity may be critical for taking coordinated action urgently and justly, they require a long time to establish or repair. A relational tipping point, in a certain respect, has already been crossed, before the ecological tipping point. The time it takes to address the passage of this relational tipping point may be too slow to generate the coordinated action to halt certain dangers related to climate change. While no possibilities for better futures should be left unconsidered, it's critical to center environmental justice in any analysis of whether it's too late to stop dangerous climate change.

Whyte, K

Too late for indigenous climate justice: Ecological and relational tipping points

Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Climate Change

https://doi.org/10.1002/wcc.603

In 2019, the climate emergency entered mainstream debates. The normative frame of climate justice as conceived in academia, policy arenas, and grassroots action, although imperative and growing in popularity across climate movements, is no longer adequate to address this emergency. This is for two reasons: first, as a framing for the problem, current notions of climate justice are insufficient to overcome the persistent silencing of voices belonging to multiple “others”; and second, they do not question, and thus implicitly condone, human exceptionalism and the violence it enacts, historically and in this era of the Anthropocene. Therefore, we advocate for the concept of multispecies justice to enrich climate justice in order to more effectively confront the climate crisis. The advantage of reconceptualizing climate justice in this way is that it becomes more inclusive; it acknowledges the differential histories and practices of social, environmental, and ecological harm, while opening just pathways into uncertain futures. A multispecies justice lens expands climate justice by decentering the human and by recognizing the everyday interactions that bind individuals and societies to networks of close and distant others, including other people and more-than-human beings. Such a relational lens provides a vital scientific, practical, material, and ethical road map for navigating the complex responsibilities and politics in the climate crisis. Most importantly, it delineates what genuine flourishing could mean, what systemic transformations may involve (and with whom), how to live with inevitable and possibly intolerable losses, and how to prefigure and enact alternative and just futures.

Tschakert, P; Schlosberg, D; Celermajer, D; Rickards, L; Winter, C; Thaler, M; Stewart-Harawira, M; Verlie, B

Multispecies justice: climate-just futures with, for and beyond humans

Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Climate Change

https://doi.org/10.1002/wcc.699

Adaptation to climate change, in terms of both academic and policy debates, has been treated predominantly as a local issue. This scalar focus points towards local agency as well as the contested responsibilization of local actors and potential disconnects with higher-level dynamics. While there are growing calls for individuals to take charge of their own lives against mounting climatic forces, little is known about the day-to-day actions people take, the many hurdles, barriers, and limits they encounter in their adaptation choices, and the trade-offs they consider envisaging the future. To address this gap, this article draws on 80+ interviews with urban and rural residents in Western Australia to offer a nuanced analysis of everyday climate adaptation and its limits. Our findings demonstrate that participants are facing significant adaptation barriers and that, for many, these barriers already constitute limits to what they can do to protect what they value most. They also make visible how gender, age, and socioeconomic status shape individual preferences, choices, and impediments, revealing compounding layers of disadvantage and differential vulnerability. We argue that slow and reflexive research is needed to understand what adaptation limits matter and to whom and identify opportunities to harness and support local action. Only then will we be able to surmount preconceived neoliberal ideals of the self-sufficient, resilient subject, engage meaningfully with ontological pluralism, and contribute to the re-politicization of adaptation decision-making.

Henrique, KP; Tschakert, P

Everyday limits to adaptation

Oxford Open Climate Change

https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfclm/kgab013

As observed and predicted losses and damages from climate change impacts grow increasingly severe, calls for transformation as a response to long-term climate change have become more frequent. Transformational approaches have also been integrated into the global climate change regime under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) as part of the workplan of the Executive Committee guiding the implementation of the Warsaw international mechanism, the oversight body on loss and damage. However, there has as yet been no attempt to define what is meant by transformation in the context of loss and damage. This paper attempts to clarify the burgeoning academic and policy literature by positing three types of transformation as a response to loss and damage: transformation as adaptation (an intensification of dominant socio-ecological relationships), transformation as extension (when the limits of established adaptive capacity are reached) and transformation as liberation (adopting development pathways that address the root causes of vulnerability). Transformation as liberation is proposed as a deeper change to social-technological systems to avoid and minimize loss and damage in ways that enhance social justice and sustainability. To provide the kind of information decision makers need to plan and implement transformation as liberation, more research is needed on how to plan in a way that ensures the most equitable outcomes.

Roberts, E; Pelling, M

Loss and damage: an opportunity for transformation?

The Third Pillar of International Climate Change Policy

https://doi.org/10.1080/14693062.2019.1680336

The effects of climate change, whether they be via slow- or rapid-onset events such as extreme events, are inflicting devastating losses and damage on communities around the world, with the most vulnerable affected the most. Although the negative impacts of climate change and the concept of loss and damage are included in international conventions, such as the United Nations Warsaw International Mechanism for Loss and Damage and Article 8 of the Paris Agreement, these stop short of providing clear compensation mechanisms. The science of loss and damage has evolved with the development of extreme event attribution science, which assesses the probability of an extreme event being influenced by anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions, but loss and damage still suffers from the lack of a clear definition and measurability and is further complicated by debates on climate justice and shared but differentiated responsibilities. This primer presents an overview of loss and damage, discusses the complexities and knowledge gaps, and proposes next steps for an interdisciplinary research agenda.

Boyd, E; Chaffin, BC; Dorkenoo, K; Jackson, G; Harrington, L; N'guetta, A; Johansson, EL; Nordlander, L; Paolo De Rosa, S; Raju, E; Scown, M; Soo, J; Stuart-Smith, R

Loss and damage from climate change: A new climatejustice agenda

One Earth

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.oneear.2021.09.015

Climate change researchers argue that a residual domain exists beyond the limits of adaptation to prevent deleterious climate change impacts: this has been labeled as “loss and damage.” Over the last 8 years, there has been significant growth in loss and damage scholarship thus making it imperative to take stock of what we know already and directions for future research. We undertook a quantitative review of academic publications (n = 122) in the loss and damage field to date and documented study characteristics, thematic areas, trends, gaps, and opportunities. The first publication appeared in 2010 before a significant increase in published research after 2013. Although increasingly diverse over time, loss and damage studies have primarily focused on technical, political, and normative questions. Our analysis suggests the following: that researchers predominately conceptualize loss and damage as “limits to adaptation”; that the literature is more practical (i.e., descriptive, does not challenge underlying presuppositions) than critical (i.e., challenges underlying presuppositions) in orientation; that loss and damage is conceived as both an occurring and future condition; and that economic dimensions of loss and damage are prioritized in studies. Recommended future research directions include empirical and theoretical explorations of the potential for transformational change; understanding what people value and how they can engage with loss and grief; ensuring the perspectives of the most vulnerable groups are included in decision-making; and greater policy-relevant research and critical analyses of loss and damage conceptualizations and the Warsaw International Mechanism.

McNamara, KE; Jackson, G

Loss and damage: a review of the literature and directions for future research

Climate Change

https://doi.org/10.1002/wcc.564

A decision was made at the UNFCCC, COP-18 meeting in Doha in 2012 to create a work programme on loss and damage. Part of this programme was to include the production of a technical paper to enhance the general understanding of non-economic losses from climate change. The following article looks carefully at that paper in order to discover whether it provides an adequate conceptual understanding of non-economic losses. Several shortcomings of the paper’s conceptualization of these losses are identified. An alternative ethical framework with methods better suited for capturing a fuller range of non-economic losses is considered. This framework is likely to be most useful if used prospectively for the purpose of devising better adaptation policies to head off potential future losses rather than if used retrospectively for quantifying losses that have already occurred for the purposes of providing compensation.

Preston, CJ;

Challenges and opportunities for understanding non-economic loss and damage

Ethics, Policy & Environment

https://doi.org/10.1080/21550085.2017.1342962

Loss and Damage (L&D) has been the subject of contentious debate in international climate policy for several decades. Recently, formal mechanisms on L&D have been established, but arguably through unclear language. This ambiguity is politically important, but researchers and practitioners require clearer understandings of L&D. Here we report on the first in-depth empirical study of actor perspectives, including interviews with 38 key stakeholders in research, practice, and policy. We find points of agreement and also important distinctions in terms of: the relationship between L&D and adaptation, the emphasis on avoiding versus addressing L&D, the relevance of anthropogenic climate change, and the role of justice. A typology of four perspectives is identified, with different implications for research priorities and actions to address L&D. This typology enables improved understanding of existing perspectives and so has potential to facilitate more transparent discussion of the options available to address L&D.

Boyd, E; James, RA; Jones, RG; Young, HR; Otto, FE

A typology of loss and damage perspectives

Climate Change

https://doi.org/10.1038/nclimate3389

The concept of non-economic losses (NELs) has recently emerged in the context of negotiations on loss and damage under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). NELs are losses of values that are not commonly traded in markets but bear high relevance for those affected. Examples include loss of life, biodiversity and cultural heritage. The ongoing institutionalization of approaches to loss and damage under the UNFCCC offers great opportunities to provide a sound information base for policy- and decision-making on NELs. Available expertise to meet the emerging knowledge needs includes insights into relevant indicators, and adequate means of integrating NELs into decision-making processes that seek to reduce losses ex-ante. Further research is needed to identify or develop appropriate responses to NELs ex-post. Here, historical analogues of loss and practices of remembrance and recognition can provide valuable insights. Opportunities for engagement exist at the UNFCCC’s science-policy interface. These include participation and active engagement at open meetings under the UNFCCC to advance exchange on applied research that is framed around policy-relevant questions on NELs as well as interaction with the expert group on NELs that was set up under the designated policy body to work on loss and damage under the UNFCCC, i.e. the Warsaw International Mechanism.

Serdeczny, OM; Bauer, S; Huq, S

Non-economic losses from climate change: opportunities for policy-oriented research

Climate and Development

https://doi.org/10.1080/17565529.2017.1372268

How does an idea emerge and gain traction in the international arena when its underpinning principles are contested by powerful players? The adoption in 2013 of the Warsaw International Mechanism on Loss and Damage as part of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) puzzled observers, because key state parties, such as the United States, had historically opposed the policy. This article examines the roles of frame contestation and ambiguity in accounting for the evolution and institutionalization of the “loss and damage” norm within the UNFCCC. The article applies frame analysis to the data from coverage of the negotiations and elite interviews. It reveals that two competing framings, one focused on liability and compensation and the other on risk and insurance, evolved into a single, overarching master frame. This more ambiguous framing allowed parties to attach different meanings to the policy that led to the resolution of differences among the parties and the embedding of the idea of loss and damage in international climate policy.

Vanhala, L; Hestbaek, C

Framing climate change loss and damage in UNFCCC negotiations

Global Environmental Politics

https://doi.org/10.1162/GLEP_a_00379

‘Losses and damages’ refer to impacts of climate change that have not been, or cannot be, avoided through mitigation and adaptation efforts. After the establishment of the Warsaw International Mechanism for Loss and Damage (WIM), Loss and Damage is now considered the third pillar – besides mitigation and adaptation – of climate action under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). This paper studies what the Contribution of Working Group II to the Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC WGII AR5) has to say about this emerging topic. We use qualitative data analysis software (text mining) to assess which climatic stressors, impact sectors and regions the report primarily associates with losses and damages, and compare this with the focus areas of the WIM. The study reveals that IPCC WGII AR5 primarily associates losses and damages with extreme weather events and economic impacts, and treats it primarily as a future risk. Present-day losses and damages from slow-onset processes and non-economic losses receive much less attention. Also, surprisingly, AR5 has more to say about losses and damages in high-income regions than in regions that are most at risk, such as small island states and least developed countries. The paper concludes with recommendations to the IPCC for its 6th Assessment Report (AR6) to include more evidence on losses and damages from slow-onset processes, non-economic losses and damages and losses and damages in vulnerable countries.

van der Geest, K; Warner, K

Loss and damage in the IPCC Fifth Assessment Report (Working Group II): a text-mining analysis

Climate Policy

https://doi.org/10.1080/14693062.2019.1704678

Improving food security requires development of farmer-preferred varieties that are more nutritious and adapted to specific agro-ecologies and changing climatic conditions. Challinor et al. report that the time from initiating breeding for a trait to adoption of the resulting variety is 18 years, broadly agreeing with other findings that an average age of varieties in use in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) is 20 years2 — too long compared to the time frame in which climate models predict varietal characteristics will need to change.

Barnett, J; Tschakert, P; Head, L; Adger, WN

A science of loss

Nature Climate Change

https://doi.org/10.1038/nclimate3140

I contribute to an emerging politics of loss through an empirical analysis of temporalities of climate change loss and damage in Australia. How people temporalize climate change informs their conception of causality, designation of losses and damages, and political response. By drawing attention to the diversity of onto-epistemological understandings and characterizations of climate change loss and damage, I illuminate some of the values diverse actors perceive as currently, or at risk of, being lost. I do this by unearthing and theorizing commonly identified temporalities held by a cross-section of social actors in regional Australia. These include the following temporalities: (1) anticipatory loss; (2) natural variability; (3) future perfect (e.g., climate catastrophe, human ingenuity); and (4) the longue durée (i.e., climate change as a historical crisis linked to colonial-capitalism). I consider the social, cultural, psychological, and political determinants of such temporalities and the implications for climate politics in Australia. I argue that recognizing the complexity of temporalities of loss and damage is crucial for both geographical research and climate politics. This nuanced understanding of difference can contribute toward the development of a progressive more-than-climate politics, which, I suggest, must be based on the longue durée temporality of climate change loss and damage.

Jackson, G

More-than-climate temporalities of loss and damage in Australia

Annals of the American Association of Geographers

https://doi.org/10.1080/24694452.2023.2223611

A situated and socially engaged science of loss arising from climate change takes people’s lived experiences with risk and harm as its fundamental starting point. It foregrounds what losses occur, where and how, which of these losses matter most to people and why, and whether or not such losses are considered acceptable and potentially reversible. However, obtaining such insight is difficult if the many things people value, across space and time, are intangible, i.e. they cannot and perhaps should not be quantified, and hence are often overlooked and omitted. This is the case, for instance, for the symbolic and affective dimensions of culture and place, such as sense of belonging, personal and collective notions of identity, and ways of knowing and making sense of the world, all of which are already undermined by climate change. Here, we perform the first systematic comparative analysis of people-centered and place-specific experiences with climate-related harm to people’s values that are largely intangible and non-commensurable. We draw upon >100 published case studies from around the world to make visible and concrete what matters most to people and what is at stake in the context of climate-related hazards and impacts. We show that the same threats can produce vastly different outcomes, ranging from reversible damages to irreversible losses and anticipated future risks, across numerous value dimensions, for indigenous and non-indigenous families, communities, and countries at all levels of development. Through this analysis, we also empirically validate dimensions of harm that have been produced and reproduced in the literature, albeit often devoid of distinct substance, lived experiences, and intrinsic significance. We end by discussing ethical implications of the ‘one thousand ways’ to encounter harm and offer recommendations to overcome methodological challenges in advancing a science of loss grounded in place.

Tschakert, P; Ellis, NR; Anderson, C; Kelly, A; Obeng, J

One thousand ways to experience loss: a systematic analysis of climate-related intangible harm from around the world

Global Environmental Change

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2018.11.006

Conferences of the UN climate change convention have legacies both in formal outcomes and treaties and in raising the profile of emerging climate dilemmas. The joint legacies of COP26 in Glasgow and COP27 in Sharm el-Sheikh have been in elevating the profile and formalising the potential for solidaristic action on ‘Loss and Damage’ from climate change. This article reviews the documented outcomes on Loss and Damage from the two events to analyse the significance and constraints of this element of the overall climate change regime. Loss and Damage is likely to be constrained as a global collective action by the capacity to identify and measure losses and damages and by the ability of the climate change regime to deliver on meaningful resource transfers. Yet the formalisation of elements of climate justice through Loss and Damage is a real and lasting legacy of these COP events.

Adger, WN

Loss and Damage from climate change: legacies from Glasgow and Sharm el-Sheikh

Scottish Geographical Journal

https://doi.org/10.1080/14702541.2023.2194285

Australia has objectively suffered climate extreme-driven loss and damage—climate change impacts that cannot or will not be avoided. Recent national surveys demonstrate a growing awareness of the link between climate change and climate extremes. However, climate extremes interact with existing environmental subjectivities (i.e., how people perceive, understand, and relate to the environment), which leads to different social, cultural, and political responses. For example, people in northern Australia are familiar with climate extremes, with the heat, humidity, fires, floods, storms, and droughts intimately connected to identities and sense of place. In this climate ethnography, I demonstrate the value of undertaking environmental subjectivities analyses for research on climate-society relations. I detail how environmental subjectivities influence people’s experiences, or non-experiences, of climate extreme-driven loss and damage in northern Australia. I identify a growing concern for climate change and climate extremes are influencing environmental subjectivities. Yet, many northern Australians—even people concerned about climate change—are not, for now, connecting extreme events to climate change. A widespread subjectivity of anticipatory loss supplied people with an imagined temporal buffer, which contributes to non-urgency in political responses. Together with more structural political-economic barriers and a sense of helplessness to affect progressive change, limited action beyond individual consumer decisions and small-scale advocacy are occurring. These, amongst other, findings extend research on the role of climate extremes in climate opinion, lived experiences of loss and damage in affluent contexts, and the environmental value-action gap.

Jackson, G

Environmental subjectivities and experiences of climate extreme-driven loss and damage in northern Australia

Climatic Change

https://doi.org/10.1007/s10584-023-03567-4

Loss and damage is the “third pillar” of international climate governance alongside mitigation and adaptation. When mitigation and adaptation fail, losses and damages occur. Scholars have been reacting to international political discourse centred around governing actual or potential severe losses and damages from climate change. Large gaps exist in relation to understanding the underlying power dimensions, rationalities, knowledges, and technologies of loss and damage governance and science. We draw from a Foucauldian-inspired governmentality framework to argue there is an emerging governmentality of loss and damage. We find, among other things, that root causes of loss and damage are being obscured, Western knowledge and technocratic interventions are centred, and there are colonial presupposed subjectivities of Global South victims of climate change, which are being contested by people bearing the brunt of the climate crisis. We propose future directions for critical research on climate change loss and damage.

Jackson, G; N'Guetta, A; De Rosa, SP; Scown, M; Dorkenoo, K; Chaffin, B; Boyd, E

An emerging governmentality of climate change loss and damage

Progress in Environmental Geography

https://doi.org/10.1177/27539687221148748