This paper, published in the Global Environmental Change journal, argues that the prevalent use of incremental and proximate climate change adaptation approaches should be integrated with more long-term transformational strategies. Through a comprehensive literature review of adaptation research, the paper finds that ‘framing’ is a critical influence in the effectiveness of adaptation actions; using the metaphor of ‘pathways’ to emphasise the adaptive process required is useful in the face of uncertainty, inter-temporal complexity, and competing, interdependent cultural forces. The authors here aim to broaden this pathways approach, providing insights on diagnosing the need for systemic change, and guidance on the role of incremental change in achieving this.
The review found three broad types of adaptation studies: recent assessments of adaptation practice, particularly in developed countries, though with little evidence of actual action outside of climate sensitive sectors (coastal communities, etc); numerous studies characterising limits, barriers to, and opportunities within adaptation, developing theoretical and conceptual foundations, and assessing vulnerabilities which, while accepted as useful, has again led to little implementation; and reports of on-ground adaptation practices which predominantly fail to acknowledge the potential for entire ecosystem shift, instead seeking specific resilience in order to maintain present services.
Recent adaptation discourse has developed techniques and tools for dealing with long time horizons, distributed decision-making, and contested values; turning previous barriers of decision-making into an adaptive, pathways approach suited for the complexity (or complicatedness) of the system under study. Such an approach assumes that: climate adaptation is inseparable from cultural, economic, and environmental contexts; its impacts across spatial and jurisdictional boundaries can result in threshold effects; feedback loops and system inertia currently express themselves as path-dependency and lock-in; that quantification of complexity is inherently difficult; and that understanding base-line interdependency is crucial for understanding a complex system. In short, the more complex or open a system, the more one has to address ‘deep-root’ issues, requiring open communication, participation, and negotiation with all stakeholders involved. With the scale of the climate change becoming ever more great as emissions continue to rise, present adaptation initiatives are ill-equipped to deal with the uncertainty and complexity involved. Pro-active preparation will require responses that cycle between the incremental and the transformative, the latter of which should now be researchers primary focus.