Theorectical Approaches to Adaptation

There is no single approach or simple formula to adapt to climate change.  Many different approaches exist. Each approach offers a different lens with which to understand adaptation.  Each also takes a slightly different approach to conducting a climate change impact assessment or adaptation assement and plan, and may prioritize some decision-making factors over others.

• A Risk-based Adaptation Approach stems from the field of risk-management and decision theory.  A risk based impact assessment typically focuses on identifying hazards (climate change may be one among many), assessing the severity of the hazards and the probability of their occurrence and then ranking hazards from lowest to highest risk.  The goal of the adaptation strategy in this case would be to find a way to mitigate the most severe risks in the most cost-effective and efficient way and/or to invest in initiatives which enhance capacity to deal with the risks.  This approach typically gives preference to managing climate risks which we can know and measure, with some certainty.  
  

• A Vulnerability-based Adaptation Approach focuses on understanding how sensitive or exposed particular ecosystems or populations are to climate change.  An impact assessment of this kind, would look at how highly fragile ecosystems or vulnerable populations, such as the poor, the elderly and the young will be effected by climate change.  This will be determined in part by the risks they face, but more importantly, by how sensitive they are to climate changes.  The adaptation strategy in this case would typically focus on addressing the underlying causes of their vulnerability – whether it be social or economic inequality, habitat encroachment or some other combination of factors.
  

• A Resilience-based Adaptation Approach stems from natural resource management and ecology.  It is a broad assessment of total system integrity; it considers the capacity of the entire socio-economic and ecological network in any given region or sector to adapt to climate change, with a particular focus on assessing how much disturbance a society or ecological system can take before it starts to loose its capacity to function as a system.  An adaptation strategy based on resilience, would focus on building the capacity of systems to withstand disturbance and change, by making the sytems more robust, more flexible and diverse. 

Of the three, the risk-based assessment may be the most commonly used approach because of its focus on risk and of protecting assets of physical/material value.   All three approaches are important however and aspects of each approach may be combined together to create a kind of multi-disciplinary approach to assessing impacts and developing adaptation strategies.   This review of adaptation approaches is based on a 2009 paper by Eakin, Thompkins, Nelson and Anderlies, which can be accessed here.