The Adaptive Challenge of Climate Change

This book presents a new perspective on adaptation to climate change. It considers climate change as more than a problem that can be addressed solely through technical expertise. Instead, it approaches climate change as an adaptive challenge that is fundamentally linked to beliefs, values and worldviews, as well as to power, politics, identities and interests. Drawing on case studies from high-income countries, the book argues that it is time to consider adaptation to climate change as a challenge of social, personal and political transformations. The authors represent a variety of fields and perspectives, illustrating the importance of interdisciplinary approaches to the problem. The book will be of interest to researchers, policymakers and advanced students in the environmental sciences, social sciences and humanities, as well as to decision makers and practitioners interested in new ideas about adapting to climate change.

Table of Contents:
1. Climate change as an adaptive challenge Karen O'Brien and Elin Selboe; 2. The intangibles of climate change adaptation: philosophy, ethics and values Bertrand Guillaume and Stijn Neuteleers; 3. Urban climate change policy transitions: views from New York City and London William Solecki, Lesley Patrick and Zoe Sprigings; 4. Planning for climate change adaptation in urban areas Jan Erling Klausen, Inger-Lise Saglie, Knut Bjørn Stokke and Marte Winswold; 5. The challenge of governing adaptation in Australia Steven Waller and Jon Barnett; 6. Emerging equity and justice concerns for climate change adaptation: a case study of New York State Peter Vancura and Robin Leichenko; 7. Transforming towards or away from sustainability? How conflicting interests and aspirations influence local adaptation Siri Eriksen and Elin Selboe; 8. Opportunistic adaptation: new discourses on oil, equity and environmental security Berit Kristoffersen; 9. Place attachment, identity and adaptation Tare Quinn, Irene Lorenzoni and W. Neil Adger; 10. Values and traditional practices in adaptation to climate change - evidence from a Q method study in two communities in Labrador, Canada Johanna Wolf, Ilana Allice and Trevor Bell; 11. Exploring vulnerability and adaptation narratives among fishers, farmers and municipal planners in Northern Norway Grete K. Hovelsrud, Jennifer J. West and Halvor Dannevig; 12. Changes in organizational culture, changes in adaptive capacity? Examples from the Norwegian and Swedish electricity sectors Tor Håkon Inderberg; 13. From informant to actor to leader: social-ecological inventories as a catalyst for leadership development in participatory community climate change adaptation Bradley May; 14. Participation and learning for climate change adaptation: a case study of the Swedish forestry sector Åsa Gerger Swartling, Oskar Wallgren, Richard J. T. Klein, Johanna Ulmanen and Maja Dahlin; 15. Integral GIS: widening the frame of reference for adaptation planning Lynn D. Rosentrater; 16. There must be more: communication to close the cultural divide Susanne C. Moser and Carol L. Berzonsky; 17. Social transformation: the real adaptive challenge Karen O'Brien and Elin Selboe.

About the Author :
Karen O'Brien is a Professor in the Department of Sociology and Human Geography at the Universitetet i Oslo. She has been working on various aspects of climate change for over twenty-five years, including on impacts, vulnerability and adaptation and the implications for human security. She also works on the links between global environmental change and globalization. Her current research explores adaptation as a social, cultural and human process, the relationships between belief system flexibility and adaptive capacity, and the values and visions of youth towards the future in a changing climate. She is on the Future Earth Science Committee and has participated in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Fourth and Fifth Assessment Reports, as well as the IPCC Special Report on extreme events. She has co-authored and co-edited numerous books, including Environmental Change and Globalization: Double Exposures (2008), Adapting to Climate Change: Thresholds, Values, Governance (Cambridge, 2009), Climate Change, Ethics and Human Security (Cambridge, 2010), and Climate Change Adaptation and Development: Transforming Paradigms and Practices (2015). Elin Selboe holds a Ph.D. in Human Geography from the Universitetet i Oslo. She has researched local mobilization and politics in Senegal, with her dissertation focusing on the dynamics of social networks and participation in associational life in the context of economic crisis, changes in political Islam and processes of democratization. She has been researching the politics and social organization of adaptation to climate change in Norway and currently holds a postdoctoral position in the project Voices of the Future: Values and Visions of Norwegian Youth on Responses to Climate Change.