Science for Loss and Damage. Findings and Propositions

The debate on Loss and Damage (L&D)¹ has gained traction over the last few years. Although the discourse started already during the establishment of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in the early 1990s with a proposal by the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS) on compensation and insurance for losses due to sea-level rise (INC 1991), it took about 20 years, alongside increasing evidence and public awareness of climate change impacts and risks as collated prominently in reports by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), for it to be recognised at the institutional level. In 2007 UNFCCC’s 13th Conference of the Parties (COP 13) in Bali first broadly considered means to address Loss and Damage, yet only in 2012 at COP 18 in Doha did Parties for the first time decide to consider institutional arrangements to address L&D, which in 2013 led negotiators at COP 19 to establish the “Warsaw International Mechanism for Loss and Damage associated with Climate Change Impacts” (WIM) (UNFCCC 2013). In 2015 at COP 21, the Paris Agreement established a separate article on L&D endorsing the Mechanism (UN 2015) (see Fig. 1.1). Since its establishment, the WIM, whose Executive Committee has devised work programmes to inform the deliberations, has been subject to intense debate. While some consider it a distinct building block of negotiations under the UNFCCC alongside mitigation and adaptation, others suggest that it is supposed to be an integral part of the negotiations under climate change adaptation. The implications and final directions for this Mechanism, which will undergo review in 2019, are, however, largely unclear.

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The debate currently is broad, diffuse and somewhat confusing, while concepts, methods and tools, as well as directions for policy remain vague and contested. Over the last few years, research has been requested to provide actionable input and has increasingly become active. Scholarship has started to provide evidence on losses and damages in vulnerable countries (Warner and van der Geest 2013), coined and critically examined definitions, the rationale and plural perspectives on the discourse (Verheyen and Roderick 2008; James et al. 2015; Van der Geest and Warner 2015; Vanhala and Hestbaek 2016; Boyd et al. 2017), employed applicable methods and models (Gall 2015; Birkmann and Welle 2015; Schinko and Mechler 2017), reviewed roles for justice and equity considerations (Huggel et al. 2016a; Roser et al. 2015; Wallimann-Helmer 2015), spent due attention on non-economic losses (Serdeczny et al. 2017; Tschakert et al. 2017; Wewerinke-Singh 2018a), supported crafting of policy and governance options (Pinninti 2013; Page and Heyward 2017; Mechler and Schinko 2016; Crosland et al. 2016; Biermann and Boas 2017) and examined the role of legal responses to L&D (Mace and Verheyen 2016; Mayer 2016; Wewerinke-Singh 2018b).

Many gaps remain, not the least in terms of communication across the science-policy interface. Analysts and observers, including the authors of this book, have argued that these gaps have hampered understanding and progress towards effective policy formulation, as well as practical implementation. As we demonstrate in this book, a more strongly evidence-based dialogue is desirable and feasible, and we see a number of promising options for instilling more coherence into the debate and foster alignment with other policy agendas, particularly with regard to climate change adaptation (CCA), current international efforts on disaster risk reduction (DRR), as well as the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

The volume overall is organised into five sections: Sect. 1 sets the stage with key concepts and insights regarding trends in impacts and risks, while Sect. 2 presents critical issues that increasingly are shaping the policy discourse. In Sect. 3, methods and tools for research and practice are reviewed in terms of their applicability, Sect. 4 presents place-based evidence and insights on losses and damages as well as any soft and hard limits across geographies, and finally in Sect. 5, policy options and other actions for the L&D discourse are discussed. This introductory chapter further elaborates on the evolution of the discourse, presents key concepts of relevance and salience that arise from the book, shortly summarises the individual chapters, and concludes by outlining a number of propositions that link relevant findings to forward-looking suggestions for research, practice and policy.

Formal and informal deliberations regarding “dangerous” climate-related risks and sharing the burdens (including justice considerations) associated with responses to climate change have been fundamental for shaping the climate debate since the beginning (see also chapter by Calliari et al. 2018; see Fig. 1.1). Science, in particular as reported by the IPCC assessments, has had a major impact on policy formulation and decisions as part of the UNFCCC (see Fig. 1.2). Given the ultimate objective as stipulated by the UNFCCC in 1992 “to prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system” (UN 1992, Art. 2), the focus of the UNFCCC was originally–and continues to predominantly be–on climate mitigation responses. The first discussions about L&D were initiated by the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS) in the early 1990s with due linkages to mitigation. During the negotiations that led to adoption of the UNFCCC in 1992, AOSIS proposed the establishment of, what they called, an international insurance scheme–also referred to by some as a compensation fund–to be supported by mandatory contributions from industrialised parties on the basis of their gross national product and relative greenhouse gas emissions (INC 1991).

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The scheme was intended to compensate small island- and low-lying developing nations for climate-related impacts from sea-level rise (Linnerooth-Bayer et al. 2003; AOSIS 2008; see the chapters by Schäfer et al. 2018 and Linnerooth-Bayer et al. 2018). While the proposal was eventually dropped, discussions on compensation and insurance as a means to address the adverse effects of climate change prevailed with expert workshops convened in 2003 and 2007 on the basis of COP decisions 5/CP 7 and 1/CP 10 and COP13 started to consider means to address Loss and Damage (Mace and Verheyen 2016).

In 2008, AOSIS submitted an expanded version of the 1991 proposal to the Ad Hoc Working Group on Long-term Cooperative Action under the Convention (AWG-LCA). This Multi Window Mechanism to Address Loss and Damage from Climate Change Impacts in Small Island Developing States (SIDS) and other developing countries particularly vulnerable to the impacts of climate change comprised three interdependent components: (1) insurance; (2) rehabilitation/compensation; and (3) risk management (AOSIS 2008). The idea of an “international mechanism addressing risk management and risk reduction strategies and insurance related risk sharing and risk transfer mechanisms” was reiterated a year later in the AOSIS proposal for a Copenhagen Protocol (UNFCCC 2009).

After losses and damages were mentioned in the 2007 Bali Action Plan (UNFCCC 2007), the 2010 Cancun Adaptation Framework (UNFCCC 2010) initiated formal UNFCCC activities on the issue with the establishment of an ad hoc work programme (UNFCCC 2011). The latter was meant to advance technical work on L&D in three thematic areas over the course of 2011 and 2012: (1) assessing the risk of L&D and the current knowledge on the same; (2) proposing a range of approaches to address L&D from both extreme and slow onset events, taking into consideration experience at all levels; and (3) determining the role of the Convention in enhancing the implementation of approaches to address L&D (UNFCCC 2012). Since its inception, the work programme has conducted several calls for submissions asking parties (national government representatives) and observers (other organisations attending UNFCCC meetings) for input on specific questions. These calls gave parties, observers and non-admitted organisations the opportunity to lay out their views on thematic issues, institutional questions, governance arrangements and suggestions on how to take the L&D work programme forward.

As part of the Doha Climate Gateway in 2012, the Parties decided to establish institutional arrangements to address L&D at COP 19. This laid the groundwork for the creation of the WIM, that is charged to “address loss and damage associated with impacts of climate change, including extreme events and slow onset events, in developing countries that are particularly vulnerable to the adverse effects of climate change” (UNFCCC 2013, para 1). COP19 also established an Executive Committee (ExCom) to guide the implementation of functions of the WIM through an initial 2-year work plan. A distinct L&D article in the Paris Agreement (UNFCCC 2015, Article 8) at COP 21 meant further recognition for L&D and the WIM, and arguably, institutional anchoring within the UNFCCC architecture.

The action areas for work under the WIM have been broad and diverse, ranging in scope and focus. Action areas include considering particularly vulnerable countries, populations and ecosystems, dealing with both slow- and sudden-onset events, and paying particular attention to non-economic losses. Policy areas include consideration for resilience, recovery and rehabilitation efforts, migration, displacement and mobility, as well as financial instruments including insurance. The work plan is intended to integrate also with other on-going work under the UNFCCC, such as on finance and technology.

Fundamental to this book, and the climate policy debate in general, has been the concept of comprehensive risk management including transformational approaches. The mandate of the WIM includes enhancing understanding of and promoting both short- and medium-term risk management, including risk analysis, risk reduction, risk transfer and risk retention. Furthermore, the WIM is to consider transformational approaches that help to build and strengthen the long-term resilience of countries and communities (UNFCCC 2016, Decision 3/CP.22). Since the establishment of the WIM, the ExCom has met several times and has transitioned from its initial 2-year work plan to a 5-year rolling work plan. Achievements and the WIM will officially be reviewed at COP 25 in 2019.

Recent non-climate policy developments, such as the compact on Sendai (UNISDR 2015), the SDGs (UN 2015), as well as the Nansen Initiative on Displacement (nanseninitiative.org) and its follow-up, the Platform on Disaster Displacement (Displacement Solutions 2015) provide potential opportunities to increase understanding of and respond to growing climate-related risks, including L&D. However, these approaches and preliminary actions are scattered across several sectors and actors, and their relevance to L&D has not yet been systematically evaluated with little exchange between research and policy. In addition, attention to L&D in research and policy has tended to focus heavily on only a few aspects, such as insurance. Broader reflection, particularly on the different dimensions of L&D decision-making has been largely lacking.

Some observers have suggested that there has been a shift in the debate away from “harmful wrongdoing” (1.) to mostly considering support for risk and climate insurance mechanisms (3.) (see Serdeczny and Zamarioli 2018). While indeed, insurance mechanisms have been given substantial attention, it seems that the debate overall has become more comprehensive and the three discursive lines rather exist in parallel offering potential to be further aligned as delineated in this book (see also Mechler 2017).

Over the last few years research on L&D has grown in number and focus. In this section, we summarise some of the most relevant findings from the various book chapters providing a review of key topics addressed in the book. Building on forewords by policy makers and negotiators from developing (Dawn Pierre-Nathoniel of the Small Island State of Saint Lucia) and developed countries (Ingrid-Gabriela Hoven of Germany), the book is divided into five sections, for which we shortly summarise the respective chapters.

The book chapters cover specific issues showing the wide variety of research on L&D, as well as the many interconnections, shared concepts, tools and methods. In this section, we align some of the key findings and suggestions for moving forward. We identify five key propositions that, as we assert, hold potential for providing a roadmap for further ‘grounding’ the so far highly political debate. The propositions are essentially cross-cutting and reflect the architecture of the book in terms of considering insights from the various sections (setting the stage, critical issues, methods and tools, cases, policy options). The propositions each build on relevant findings that then inform suggestions for an actionable element to be taken forward by research, policy and practice.

The L&D debate has been polarised between those advocating for compensation for actual losses and damages, and others suggesting support for tackling future risks by (further) employing disaster risk management and climate insurance solutions. While L&D remains a political concept developed during the UNFCCC negotiations, it has (some of) its technical roots in risk management, which can be built upon to identify a joint and distinct policy space (see chapters by Schinko et al. 2018; Botzen et al. 2018; van den Homberg and McQuistan 2018).

Risk management brings along established practices for dealing with extreme events and any trends therein, and thus may provide an operational framework with a tested set of methods and tools (see Bouwer 2018; Botzen et al. 2018). Yet, a broader perspective on climate risk research and policy appears sorely needed. In its 5th Assessment Report (IPCC 2014b), the IPCC laid the foundations for such a perspective by broadly defining climate-related risks and the potential (as well as limits) for adaptation to key risks faced by geographic regions both today and in the future, characterised by scenarios of aggressive or business-as-usual mitigation and adaptation. This perspective requires to take into account non-economic losses and damages (NELD) such as to human health and lives, but also losses of cultural identity and sacred places. The issue of NELD, which has garnered substantial attention in the discourse, but is generally not accounted for in standard DRR approaches, implies a need for well considering its two main characteristics, context-dependence and incommensurability (Serdeczny 2018).

Understanding and acting on climate risks is intricately linked to justice and ethical considerations. Justice and fairness issues have played a key role in the climate change policy and academic discourse since the beginning of the UNFCCC process–most prominently through the distributive justice principle of “common but differentiated responsibilities” (UNFCCC 1992). These considerations also come into play when contemplating issues of compensatory justice due to the unequal distribution of historical and current greenhouse gas emissions, the adverse distribution of impacts between the global North and South, and the understanding that climate change is projected to lead to unavoidable and potentially irrecoverable losses and damages (chapter by Wallimann-Helmer et al. 2018). Building on risk and justice principles, Schinko et al. 2018 propose a distinct L&D policy action space that can be identified by aligning a needs-based, distributive justice perspective, proposing support for transformative climate risk management beyond adaptation possibilities, with a compensatory justice perspective which upholds considerations for curative options for liabilities attributable to anthropogenic climate change (see also Mechler and Schinko 2016).

Interestingly, both types of principles and policy actions are already seeing some, if incipient, attention today. Transformative risk management is increasingly debated in the L&D discourse, and involves issues such as offering alternative livelihoods to those that are being affected (e.g., switching from smallholder farming to service sector employment) and assisting with voluntary migration where needed. Options under this rubric exhibit substantial overlap with interventions of disaster risk reduction and adaptation, yet may be focussed further on avoiding and managing intolerable risks that touch on hard and soft limits. Insurance applications, a mainstay of policy attention, e.g., through the G20/V20 InsuResilience initiative (InsuResilience 2017), can in principle be a useful entry point for tackling transformation; yet, caution must be exercised about commercial insurance products that place the full burden on the most vulnerable. Premium support in the form of subsidies and technical assistance can potentially transform insurance into a mechanism that meets the aspirations of the L&D discussions. Insurance options furthermore hold additional potential by serving as a concept and tool for exploring the magnitude and locations of adaptation frontiers, “socio-ecological system’s transitional … operating spaces between safe and unsafe domains” (Preston et al. 2014) (see chapters by Schäfer et al. 2018 and Linnerooth-Bayer et al. 2018).

Complementing transformative risk management, largely appropriate for sudden-onset impacts and risks, with efforts for dealing with slow-onset events, the space for curative measures overlaps to some extent with demands for compensation, which have been ruled out by the Paris Agreement, but not from the debate in general (see chapters by Simlinger and Mayer 2018; Schinko et al. 2018). In addition to policy proposals in the domain of insurance, essentially a pre-arranged compensation mechanism for any losses and damages funded by premium payments of those at-risk, via a climate attribution-triggered capitalisation mechanism (see proposition 4), the most advanced ideas in the context of curative measures have been articulated with regard to support for involuntary climate-induced displacement and forced migration. A climate displacement facility is being discussed under the WIM and proposals for approaches to address climate-induced displacement have been made (e.g., through the Nansen Principles on Climate Change and Displacement (NRC & IDMC 2011) and the Peninsula Principles on Climate Displacement within States (Displacement Solutions 2015).

Identifying the financial costs associated with such a distinct risk and policy L&D space is currently extremely difficult–particularly as the remit of action has not been concretised. There are some limited studies extrapolating from estimates of climate impact and adaptation costs. If L&D is framed as dealing with residual impacts after adaptation, models using economic optimality reasoning calculate impact and option costs in the billions of US dollars; yet, as Markandya and González-Eguino (2018) find, there is currently low confidence regarding damage costs, cost of adaptation and residual impacts. Beyond finance considerations, the risk management approach to L&D—if framed comprehensively (with associated principles, methods and tools)—may indeed embrace some of the other salient perspectives of the discourse, such as those emphasising burden sharing and the limits to adaptation, and thus help to constitute a systematic platform for future work of the WIM and beyond (see chapter by Lopez et al. 2018).

Climate change attribution research originally focused on examining drivers of observed changes in global temperature. Attributing losses and damages is much more complex and requires investigating how anthropogenic greenhouse gases (GHGs) influence many other climatic variables apart from global temperature, as well as their influence on the oceans, cryosphere, biosphere, and human systems on a range of timescales. It also requires a comparison of the influence of anthropogenic emissions on hazards, with other potential drivers (for example land use change, and aerosols), as well as drivers of exposure and vulnerability. Therefore, this is not only a question for climate scientists, but requires integration of research from a number of scientific fields. Researchers are stepping up to this grand challenge and have made rapid advances, particularly in a new field of climate change attribution research focusing on single extreme weather events. This now allows statements to be made about how anthropogenic emissions have influenced the likelihood or magnitude of specific heatwaves, heavy rainfall events, wind storms, and droughts. Several recent event attribution studies have also demonstrated the influence of GHG emissions on the probability of monetary losses from flooding and loss of life from cold- and heat-related events (see chapter by James et al. 2018).

The evidence base on climate impacts is growing. As summarised in IPCC’s AR5, impacts of climate change have been observed on all continents and across all oceans. There is high confidence that worldwide glacial retreat, permafrost thawing, and mass bleaching of coral reefs can be mainly attributed to climate change (IPCC 2014a). Yet, impacts to human systems and specific events are much harder to assess due to multifactorial causation, and in particular, since vulnerability reducing actions have been employed in many locations and for many weather-related hazards (see chapters by Bouwer 2018; Lopez et al. 2018). Therefore, despite the advances, it may never be possible to generate a complete inventory of L&D attributable to anthropogenic emissions. In addition to the uncertainties inherent in the attribution problem, a lack of robust time series data in many hot spot locations hinders progress in research and risk management (Huggel et al. 2016b). Thus, policy-advisors and negotiators should not expect the emergence of fully conclusive evidence regarding the influence of climate variability and change on specific incidences of losses and damages and, in particular, should not expect the strength of evidence to be equivalent between events and between countries.

Some of the most frequently discussed applications of attribution science for L&D have been made in relation to liability and legal responses. Attribution research is relevant to private and public administration litigation as well as to breaches of customary international law—the no-harm principle (see chapter by Simlinger and Mayer 2018). In the case of litigation before a national or international court or tribunal, legal cases are faced with a myriad of technical difficulties, particularly what concerns the issue of causality. Litigation requires diligence to prevent or minimise harm, as well as considering the indirect consequences of harmful wrongdoing in addition to direct impacts, which are normally considered in litigation. Thus, the case of Lliuya versus RWE, which is currently (mid 2018) in the evidentiary stages after having been admitted to a higher regional court in Germany, is exemplary in two regards. It is considered the first case on L&D in Germany and elsewhere, as several tort-based cases have been rejected by, for example, courts in the USA. It also innovatively seeks remuneration for risk management efforts to be undertaken to avoid future, irreversible risk (loss of life) associated with glacial lake outburst flooding affected by glacial retreat attributed with high confidence to anthropogenic climate change (see chapter by Frank et al. 2018). Given the many technical difficulties to be addressed, for legal actions overall, it may be interesting to consider working with a so-called modified general causation test—as has been done successfully for other risk classes, such as tobacco, nuclear risk etc. (see chapter by Simlinger and Mayer 2018). This would mean focusing on proving that GHG emissions are generally capable of causing damages and that a causal link between action and damage is probable. Such a rationale would render the requirement to attribute a specific climatic event to the emissions of a specific person or entity unnecessary. Therefore, a lack of attribution evidence may not necessarily be a limiting factor in some legal responses. Overall, attribution research has the potential for much broader applicability. It has an important role to play in helping to understand losses and damages, including through the quantification of risks; investigating the relative importance of different drivers of change; and identifying timescales on which significant impacts of climate change emerge in different regions of the world. All of these applications are fundamental to informing actions to address, avert and minimise losses and damages.

While research on adaptation limits is still in its infancy, the L&D debate has had some focus on adaptation limits, which have been defined as points beyond which actors’ objectives are compromised by intolerable risks. Adaptation research has focused on how climate-related hazards lead to hard adaptation limits, that is, where no adaptive technologies and actions are feasible anymore (see also chapter by van den Homberg and McQuistan 2018). Soft adaptation limits, characterised by a lack of options and concurrent socio-economic trade-offs, have received less attention. In addition, empirical research on losses and damages has only recently started to consider the mediating role of ecosystems and their services provided to society (van der Geest et al. 2018). Notably, a very recent volume co-edited by Johanna Nalau, an author in this book, provides a first comprehensive overview of research and experience on adaptation limits (see Filho and Nalau 2018). As one methodological contribution along a multiple lines of evidence approach, risk analysis shows a way forward for identifying hard and particularly soft limits. Starting with risk identification for assessing risks in monetary and/or non-monetary terms, the process of risk evaluation examines the ability of agents (households, private and public sectors) to respond to risk leading to qualifications and quantifications of risk (in)tolerance.

The cases presented in this volume provide a multiple lines of evidence approach for considering any actual or potential adaptation limits. The research documented in the book has generated evidence that poor and vulnerable people and communities already persist at the edges of these boundaries and limits. Overall, the case studies in this book report multiple instances where soft and hard adaptation limits are (at risk of) being breached. Climate change is generally a key factor, yet other drivers and constraints also need to be understood and addressed. In addition, observed vulnerability dynamics imply that adaptation and building resilience lead to reductions in vulnerability.

Pacific Island states are particularly vulnerable to sea level rise, high tides, and salinisation, but also to droughts. Some communities experience seasonal food shortages, and malnutrition is common, indicating that part of the Pacific (as discussed for the state of Vanuatu) is already at or near the tolerable/intolerable interface. As a result, relocations and some resettlement are already occurring or planned (Handmer and Nalau 2018). As people move, understanding the means through which SIDS migrants maintain cultural traditions and the challenges current migrants face can help address potentially irreversible, but avoidable, losses of cultural traditions in the event of mass displacement as analysed for the Marshall Islands (Heslin 2018).

Faced with the increasing impacts of climate change and recognising that gains in development and poverty alleviation are severely hampered by climate change, the government of Bangladesh is planning to set up a national L&D mechanism to support those that have already incurred significant losses and damages beyond adaptation (Haque et al. 2018). Flood climate risk management case studies on Nepal, India, Bangladesh and Peru show limits to adaptation due to inadequate transboundary governance, insufficient devolution of mandates and funding to lower administrative levels, as well as inadequate access to and use of technology (chapters by Mechler et al. 2018b; van den Homberg and McQuistan 2018).

A case study on the Sahel and the semi-arid drylands of East Africa discusses how climate variability and change have affected primary productivity and food production as supporting and provisioning ecosystem services. Losses and damages reported in this context are livestock losses, food insecurity, displacement, cultural losses (including traditional livelihood systems), and finally, conflict related to these. The case also shows that oversimplification must be avoided in a context of multiple risk factors, including the governance or management of natural resources. Examples for risk factors presented are a lack of investment in water-related infrastructure, gaps in access to agricultural technology, barriers to pastoralists’ freedom of movement, or lack of health care services, which have also contributed to increasing losses and damages (van der Geest et al. 2018).

Migration, particularly if forced, is an example of “beyond the limits of adaptation.” Contextualising migration as multifactorial, a selection of cases including sea level rise in Pacific Island States, cyclonic storms in Bangladesh, and desertification in West Africa, as well as deforestation in South America’s Southern Cone, presents instances of migration driven by climate change and variability, as well as other factors (Heslin et al. 2018). The Arctic case on relocation and outmigration provides examples of instances “beyond adaptation” due to institutional, political, organisational and jurisdictional factors hindering implementation of adaptation to climate impacts, thus leading to losses and damages (Landauer and Juhola 2018).

Climate insurance has been one of the foci of debate on L&D and the WIM work plan. Recent experience, however, shows that insurance instruments can only serve as a risk-reducing and equitable response to losses and damages from weather extremes in developing countries if they are designed to explicitly reward risk-reducing behaviour and if they are supported by those outside the insurance pool. Commercial insurance is based on the principle of mutuality, according to which the insured participate in a disaster pool according to their risk class and pay a risk-based premium. Thus, the commercial insurance approach, unless subsidised or otherwise supported, does not share risk beyond the at-risk insured community.

This stands in contrast to most micro-insurance and regional insurance pools, which for the most part receive substantial support from the international community. Support appears to be increasingly based on the concept of solidarity, consistent with the humanitarian principles underlying development assistance, and not on attribution or responsibility for climate change impacts experienced by vulnerable countries. A common challenge with the solidarity principle, which features subsidies and other support to reduce premiums, is its failure to incentivise policyholders to reduce their risk. In meeting this challenge, international financial institutions, development agencies and other donors will need to reconcile the contending equity and preventive objectives in their support of climate insurance programs.

Two examples of insurance instruments serving the poor, the African R4 micro-insurance program and the African Risk Capacity (ARC) regional insurance pool, combine these goals. Neither is a commercial insurance enterprise; neither is fully characterised by risk-based premiums underlying the principle of mutuality; and both are highly subsidised. The R4 program’s success has largely been attributed to its close connection with public safety net programs in the participating countries, while ARC requires member governments to develop disbursement plans to ensure that the most vulnerable parts of the population benefit from the macro scheme. Moreover, ARC’s innovative Extreme Climate Facility (XCF) program may additionally bring in the concept of accountability, motivated by a perceived ethical or legal obligation for compensating those experiencing climate-attributed losses and damages, linked to changes in observed extreme weather in the region (Linnerooth-Bayer et al. 2018).

In general terms, insurance is a pre-arranged compensation mechanism for losses incurred and can be offered by both private and public actors. Public relief or catastrophe funds serve a similar function, while neither collecting premiums nor (typically) estimating risks. Many countries in the world have contingency funds to support victims of disasters. In Bangladesh, there is debate on whether to set up a national mechanism that would reimburse climate-related losses incurred by farmers and households that go beyond their adaptation possibilities (for example, if flooding pushes people to leave their homesteads or drought renders farming not profitable) (Haque et al. 2018).

In such a context, insurance in a wider sense (including national compensation pools) may innovatively be used as a navigational tool for exploring the adaptation frontiers (broad loci around adaptation limits). Such exploration may involve: (i) signalling the magnitude, location, and exposure to climate-related risks and cases where adaptation limits are approached or breached; (ii) supporting actors to move away from adaptation limits through improved ex-ante decision making and incentivising risk reduction and adaptation by creating a more certain environment for decisions on climate resilient development; and (iii) enabling actors with access to appropriate risk financing measures to remain in the tolerable risk space. One proposition is thus to embed climate insurance and other related instruments in a comprehensive climate risk management approach accompanied by other risk reduction and management strategies in international cooperation programs and projects (Schäfer et al. 2018).

The L&D discourse has exhibited strong ethical and legal undertones appealing to standards shared or agreed beyond the UNFCCC context, such as demanding redistribution for harm via international customary law. While it is useful to prove the need for action on L&D by appealing to moral standards recognised by both contending parties in international arenas, a change of narrative may be conducive to achieving collective action and to avoid turning the issue into a win-lose negotiation “game” (chapter by Calliari et al. 2018).

With evidence that climate impacts and risks are also strongly affecting industrialised countries directly (e.g., Arctic) and indirectly (e.g., through migration), it may be fruitful to frame the debate in terms of the benefits that acting on adaptation and its possible limits and failures could bring for developed countries. Considerations could range from working towards more resilient global supply chains to gaining support for climate displacement and refugees. Exploring mutual gains would contribute to bolstering collective action on an issue of common concern, as well as to elevate and better integrate L&D into other climate negotiation agenda items, such as capacity building, technology and the global stocktake.

A general and joint entry point is the SDG agenda, essentially supporting UN member states’ transformation around a set of global developmental goals. The SDGs, passed in 2015, constitute a universal set of 17 goals and 169 targets defining development aspiration and ideally, collective transformation for all signatory countries (UN 2015). The SDG debate casts an integrated and unifying perspective on development. Integrated—as it requires a synergistic look across these broad development goals, and unifying—as it involves all signatories (Dodds and Donoghue 2016). Risk is fundamental in many regards. There are down-side risks (disasters and climate-related impacts as at the heat of the L&D discourse), which are explicitly and implicitly mentioned in many of the SDGs. The need for and benefits of up-side risk taking through increased investment into the socio-economic development objectives is another one of the cross-cutting issues.

Transformative risk management, which, as we argue, should be one of the pillars of the L&D policy space, thus may be one of those issues of common concern (Schinko et al. 2018). Innovative polycentric science-society partnership models are springing up to support the implementation of transformative risk management options that manage critical disaster risks “on the ground”. Evidence from hotspots, not only has potential to inform better development policies, but may also support actions in industrialised countries facing similar issues (Mechler et al. 2018b). The role of technology is crucial in this context, as it shapes risks and limits to adaptation and risk management. Yet, access in developing countries is constrained. National hydrological and meteorological services in developing countries, for example, are limited in their possibilities to improve the spatial and temporal resolution of flood forecasts. This is because these countries lack the funding and capacity necessary to use state-of-the-art technology (i.e., computing power, advanced hydrological and meteorological models) and acquire or collect more granular data, such as digital-elevation-model data. In addition, the poor and the vulnerable can often not benefit from early warning/early action information due to the digital divide.

As an area of future work, progressive levels of innovation and technology are required to lead from incremental to transformative change, where the UNFCCC’s Technology Mechanism can play a more prominent role (van den Homberg and McQuistan 2018). The WIM Executive Committee may innovatively consider an assessment of technologies from a climate justice perspective, which means rethinking access, use, innovation, finance, and (bottom-up) governance mechanisms from the perspective of the poor and vulnerable.

Enabling joint learning regarding technologies (and other means of implementation) for buffering against high-level risks is necessary for understanding how to overcome soft and avoid hard limits. This may be appealing for developed and developing countries sharing similar exposure and risk, where limits to adaptation need attention (e.g., in the Arctic, mountain areas with glacial retreat, etc.). A joint narrative will be needed to support and incentivise the requisite transformation of energy generation, consumption, but also adaptation efforts across the globe. An improved understanding of actual and potential “dangerous interference with the climate system” at risk management scales and across geographies may indeed be a decisive enabler.

The book has been a joint effort of the Loss and Damage Network that brings together scientists and practitioners from more than 40 institutions around the globe to inform the L&D debate. Offering a detailed overview of the multiple facets of knowledge emerging on the topic of L&D, the volume is a first comprehensive review of the state of play regarding the science, political debate, practice as well as any policy proposals seeing or looking for implementation. The WIM is now well into its 5-year work plan, and after COP23 in Bonn, the first climate summit chaired by a small island state (Fiji), the WIM stands to deliver on its various workstreams. In 2018, one focus is on the role of finance in supporting actions to address L&D, for which the so-called Suva expert dialogue was carried out in mid-2018 to project a way forward. This and other activities will inform the review of the WIM by the UNFCCC Parties during sessions of the subsidiary bodies in 2019, leading to proper review at COP25 in Rio. As we demonstrated, the science has matured, and interest in the issues is increasing. The IPCC has started to pick up on the discussion and considers L&D in its 1.5 °C report published in October 2018, in special reports on oceans and the cryosphere, and land, as well as in its 6th Assessment Report due in 2022.

Further work is to be done, ideally in close collaboration with policy advisors, negotiators, civil society, private- and public-sector representatives and, particularly, those vulnerable people and communities around the world that are actually and potentially affected by climate-related impacts and risks. The partners in the Loss and Damage Network stand ready to further contribute to the debate and help to identify actions to avert, address and minimise Loss&Damage.