Anne Jerneck
Professor, Docent
Enabling local adaptation to climate change: towards collective action in Flagler Beach, Florida, USA
Author
Summary, in English
Local communities around the world are directly exposed to impacts of climate
change. It is also clear that many local governments are politically and economically constrained in their capacity to implement needed adaptations. These constraints can restrict adaptation options to incremental, or even maladaptive, practices. At the same time, necessary transformational actions may remain out of reach for local actors. Building on five years of collaborative research with the city of Flagler Beach (Florida, USA), we draw on political process theories to describe how incremental adaptation activities that are possible within current constraints can serve to build local capacity for instigating reforms at higher scales of social organization. We use the concept of a collective action strategy to conceptualize how context-specific barriers to adaptation can be overcome. From our analysis, an idealized multi-step process for designing collective action strategies is presented. The study advances scholarship on limits to adaptation beyond the diagnosis of barriers to action by taking steps towards developing context-specific strategies for overcoming these barriers.
change. It is also clear that many local governments are politically and economically constrained in their capacity to implement needed adaptations. These constraints can restrict adaptation options to incremental, or even maladaptive, practices. At the same time, necessary transformational actions may remain out of reach for local actors. Building on five years of collaborative research with the city of Flagler Beach (Florida, USA), we draw on political process theories to describe how incremental adaptation activities that are possible within current constraints can serve to build local capacity for instigating reforms at higher scales of social organization. We use the concept of a collective action strategy to conceptualize how context-specific barriers to adaptation can be overcome. From our analysis, an idealized multi-step process for designing collective action strategies is presented. The study advances scholarship on limits to adaptation beyond the diagnosis of barriers to action by taking steps towards developing context-specific strategies for overcoming these barriers.
Department/s
- LUCSUS (Lund University Centre for Sustainability Studies)
- Faculty Office
Publishing year
2019-11-30
Language
English
Pages
631-649
Publication/Series
Climatic Change
Issue
157
Links
- Publication in Lund University research portal
- https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10584-019-02611-6?wt_mc=Internal.Event.1.SEM.ArticleAuthorOnlineFirst&utm_source=ArticleAuthorOnlineFirst&utm_medium=email&utm_content=AA_en_06082018&ArticleAuthorOnlineFirst_20191201
- http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10584-019-02611-6
Document type
Journal article
Publisher
Springer
Topic
- Social Sciences Interdisciplinary
Keywords
- Scale
- Barrier to adaptation
- Incremental adaptation
- transformational adaptation
- social change
- strategy
Status
Published
ISBN/ISSN/Other
- ISSN: 0165-0009