Handling adaptation policy choices in Sweden, Germany, the UK and the Netherlands

Massey, Eric; Huitema, Dave; Garrelts, Heiko; Grecksch, Kevin; Mees, Heleen; Rayner, Tim; Storbjörk, Sofie; Termeer, Catrien; Winges, Maik

doi:10.2166/wcc.2014.110

Cited by 23 publications

(28 citation statements)

References 31 publications

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“…We argue that such choices can vary in a number of respects. Below we detail these (following Jordan et al 2010) and how they could relate to climate change adaptation (following Massey et al 2015).…”

Section: Governance Choicesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Have they deliberately caused it or was it an unforeseen outcome of their otherwise legitimate activities? Massey et al (2015) suggest that for adaptation to climate change, governments have had a range of options for how to frame and define the adaptation problem. Adaptation has variously been framed as a problem of minimizing risks and sensitivity of people and nature to expected climate impacts, or as a problem of developing the capacity to cope with just extreme weather events, or conversely a problem of developing ways to take advantage of new climatic conditions.…”

Section: Problem Choicesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…They indicate the main choice is often presented as being between acting locally, that is, decentralization guided by the principle of subsidiarity, or at more aggregated levels, regionally, nationally, or internationally. Massey et al (2015) imply that although every policy will in one form or another manifest itself at the lowest possible level, perhaps affecting individual citizens, the level at which the policy is designed and implemented will have an impact on its possible effectiveness and distributional impact. They suggest that the development of adaptation policies be carried out across multiple levels and that adaptation is already embedded at the international level within the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the European Commission (Massey et al 2015).…”

Section: Problem Choicesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Massey et al (2015) imply that although every policy will in one form or another manifest itself at the lowest possible level, perhaps affecting individual citizens, the level at which the policy is designed and implemented will have an impact on its possible effectiveness and distributional impact. They suggest that the development of adaptation policies be carried out across multiple levels and that adaptation is already embedded at the international level within the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the European Commission (Massey et al 2015). The choices left for nation-states, according to Massey et al (2015), are about deciding what roles national, regional, and local governments can play; the degree of their involvement; and the interactions between them.…”

Section: Problem Choicesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…They suggest that the development of adaptation policies be carried out across multiple levels and that adaptation is already embedded at the international level within the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the European Commission (Massey et al 2015). The choices left for nation-states, according to Massey et al (2015), are about deciding what roles national, regional, and local governments can play; the degree of their involvement; and the interactions between them. Consequently, relevant questions are about whether there is a need for national level policy framework, or whether government should act in a more advisory, support role to the lower levels?…”

Section: Problem Choicesmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 4 more Smart Citations

The governance of adaptation: choices, reasons, and effects. Introduction to the Special Feature

Huitema¹,

Adger²,

Berkhout³

et al. 2016

E&S

Self Cite

113

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ABSTRACT. The governance of climate adaptation involves the collective efforts of multiple societal actors to address problems, or to reap the benefits, associated with impacts of climate change. Governing involves the creation of institutions, rules and organizations, and the selection of normative principles to guide problem solution and institution building. We argue that actors involved in governing climate change adaptation, as climate change governance regimes evolve, inevitably must engage in making choices, for instance on problem definitions, jurisdictional levels, on modes of governance and policy instruments, and on the timing of interventions. Yet little is known about how and why these choices are made in practice, and how such choices affect the outcomes of our efforts to govern adaptation. In this introduction we review the current state of evidence and the specific contribution of the articles published in this Special Feature, which are aimed at bringing greater clarity in these matters, and thereby informing both governance theory and practice. Collectively, the contributing papers suggest that the way issues are defined has important consequences for the support for governance interventions, and their effectiveness. The articles suggest that currently the emphasis in adaptation governance is on the local and regional levels, while underscoring the benefits of interventions and governance at higher jurisdictional levels in terms of visioning and scaling-up effective approaches. The articles suggest that there is a central role of government agencies in leading governance interventions to address spillover effects, to provide public goods, and to promote the long-term perspectives for planning. They highlight the issue of justice in the governance of adaptation showing how governance measures have wide distributional consequences, including the potential to amplify existing inequalities, access to resources, or generating new injustices through distribution of risks. For several of these findings, future research directions are suggested.

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Section: Governance Choicesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Problem Choicesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Problem Choicesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Problem Choicesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Problem Choicesmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 3 more Smart Citations

The governance of adaptation: choices, reasons, and effects. Introduction to the Special Feature

Huitema¹,

Adger²,

Berkhout³

et al. 2016

E&S

Self Cite

113

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

Frontiers in data analytics for adaptation research: Topic modeling

Lesnikowski

Belfer

Rodman

et al. 2019

WIREs Climate Change

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Rapid growth over the past two decades in digitized textual information represents untapped potential for methodological innovations in the adaptation governance literature that draw on machine learning approaches already being applied in other areas of computational social sciences. This Focus Article explores the potential for text mining techniques, specifically topic modeling, to leverage this data for large-scale analysis of the content of adaptation policy documents. We provide an overview of the assumptions and procedures that underlie the use of topic modeling, and discuss key areas in the adaptation governance literature where topic modeling could provide valuable insights. We demonstrate the diversity of potential applications for topic modeling with two examples that examine: (a) how adaptation is being talked about by political leaders in United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change; and (b) how adaptation is being discussed by decision-makers and public administrators in Canadian municipalities using documents collected from 25 city council archives. This article is categorized under: Vulnerability and Adaptation to Climate Change > Institutions for Adaptation K E Y W O R D S climate change adaptation, governance, policy, quantitative text analysis, topic models 1 | INTRODUCTION Text-based research methods have been a cornerstone of qualitative social science methods since the 1950s (Lasswell, 1952). These approaches see documents as meaningful artifacts that can be analyzed for their thematic and semantic content (Krippendorff, 2013), and they form a core component of the climate change adaptation governance literature. In lieu of directly observable and measurable indicators such as greenhouse gas emissions, adaptation governance research relies on written records, surveys, and interviews as its primary information sources about how different actors are responding to climate change impacts. Content analysis methods are commonly applied to sources such as government reports, strategic planning documents, peer reviewed and gray literature, and media stories (Araos et al.

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Adaptation planning and the use of climate change projections in local government in England and Germany

et al. 2016

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Planning for adaptation to climate change is often regarded to be a local imperative and considered to be more effective if grounded on a solid evidence base and recognisant of relevant climate projections. Research has already documented some of the challenges of making climate information usable in decision-making but has not yet sufficiently reflected on the role of the wider institutional and regulatory context. This article examines the impact of the external institutional context on the use and usability of climate projections in local government through an analysis of 44 planning and climate change (adaptation) documents and 54 semi-structured interviews with planners in England and Germany conducted between July 2013 and May 2014. We show that there is little demand for climate projections in local adaptation planning in either country due to existing policy, legal and regulatory frameworks. Local government in England has not only experienced a decline in use of climate projections, but also the waning of the climate change adaptation agenda more widely, amidst changes in the planning and regulatory framework and severe budget cuts. In Germany, spatial planning makes substantial use of past and present climate data, but the strictly regulated nature of planning prevents the use of climate projections, due to their inherent uncertainties. Findings from the two countries highlight that if we are to better understand the usability of climate projections, we need to be more aware of the institutional context within which planning decisions are made. Otherwise we run the risk of continuing to provide tools and information that are of limited use within their intended context.

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Handling adaptation policy choices in Sweden, Germany, the UK and the Netherlands

Cited by 23 publications

References 31 publications

The governance of adaptation: choices, reasons, and effects. Introduction to the Special Feature

The governance of adaptation: choices, reasons, and effects. Introduction to the Special Feature

Frontiers in data analytics for adaptation research: Topic modeling

Adaptation planning and the use of climate change projections in local government in England and Germany

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