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Governance in vulnerability assessment: the role of globalising decision-making networks in determining local vulnerability and adaptive capacity

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Abstract

Community-based vulnerability assessment has often assumed that the local is the relevant level of adaptation to climate change. This paper suggests that not only do a number of levels from the international to the regional influence which adaptations can take place locally, but the governance network that is made up by actors on different levels may to a large extent be formed in responses to globalising factors, such as internationalisation of economies and the changing role of the state. The paper presents a study of adaptation in reindeer (Rangifier tarandus) herding, forestry and fishing communities in northern Norway, Sweden, and Finland, with a focus on assessing stakeholders’ own perceptions of environmental, socio-political and economic factors that affect them. In general, the paper illustrates the integration of non-subsistence economies into large and complex interactions where local adaptation is a result of the sum of stresses impacting individual entrepreneurs, and the potential they have to adapt their practices given governance (and their access to support) on different scales.

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Notes

  1. Supplementary information has been derived through feedback on the interview results through focus group interviews with actors (including both previous interviewees and additional actors in the targeted stakeholder groups). These group discussions were used to verify (triangulate) interview results with a broader number of stakeholders, and provide feedback to the communities on the progress of the study (cf. for example, Gregory et al. 2003; UK Climate Impacts Programme 2001). In total, seven such focus group meetings were conducted (two or three in each case study area, not including the shorter feedback sessions with individual stakeholders).

  2. Interviewees in forestry were asked if and how increased forest growth, a longer growing season, possible thawing and re-freezing in spring, a later autumn and possible milder winter, possible increases in snowfall, and a shift in tree species and spread would impact them and their road use. Interviewees in reindeer herding have been asked if and how increased thawing and re-freezing in winter and spring, a later autumn and winter, warmer and drier summers, changes in insect populations and in lichen and other grazing accessibility and spread over time would impact them. Interviewees in fishing have been asked if and how warmer water temperatures, possible larger variations in weather and geographical, mainly northwards, shifts in species with possible increases in fish biomass and growth would impact them (IPCC 1998; Guisan et al. 1995; Callaghan et al. 1998; Kumpula 2001; Finland 1995; Norway 1994; Lee 1999; Høgda et al. 2001; Layton and Pashkevitch 2000; Kuoppamäki 1996; Sweden 1997; Sygna and O’Brien 2001).

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Acknowledgements

This research was undertaken under the framework of the EU FP5 BALANCE project (EU contract no. EVK2-2002-00169). The paper summarizes the results in Keskitalo (2008).

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  1. Department of Social and Economic Geography, Umeå University, 901 87, Umeå, Sweden

    E. Carina H. Keskitalo

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  1. E. Carina H. Keskitalo
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Correspondence to E. Carina H. Keskitalo.

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Keskitalo, E.C.H. Governance in vulnerability assessment: the role of globalising decision-making networks in determining local vulnerability and adaptive capacity. Mitig Adapt Strateg Glob Change 14, 185–201 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11027-008-9159-0

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