Chapter 11: Australasia
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11.7 Enabling Adaptation Decision-Making
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11.7.2 Barriers and Limits to Adaptation
There are many barriers to starting adaptation pre-emptively (very high confidence) (CCATWG, 2018) (Table 11.16). Recent institutional changes in New Zealand indicate that this is changing (11.7.1; Table 15b). Many groups are yet to engage deeply with climate change adaptation (Kench et al., 2018), and some adaptation processes are being blocked (Pearce et al., 2018; Garmestani et al., 2019; Alexandra, 2020) or exploited to deflect from mitigation responsibilities (Smith and Lawrence, 2018; Nyberg and Wright, 2020). Some actors are resistant to using climate change information (Tangney and Howes, 2016; Alexandra, 2020). Fear of litigation and demands for compensation can contribute to this reluctance (Tombs et al., 2018; O’Donnell et al., 2019)and is increasingly inviting litigation and other costs (Hodder, 2019; Bell-James and Collins, 2020). Jurisprudence is evolving from cases on projects to cases about decision-making accountability in the public and private sectors (Bell-James and Collins, 2020; Peel et al., 2020) and rights-based cases (Peel and Osofsky, 2018). National and sub-national governments may become exposed to unsustainable fiscal risk as insurers of last resort, which can lead to inequitable outcomes for vulnerable groups and future generations (11.3.8), path dependencies and negative effects on physical, social, economic and cultural systems (Hamin and Gurran, 2015; Boston and Lawrence, 2018). Cross-scale governance tensions can prevent local adaptation initiatives from performing as intended (Tschakert et al., 2016; Piggott-McKellar et al., 2019). Adaptation that draws on Māori cultural understanding in partnership with local government in New Zealand can lead to more effective and equitable adaptation outcomes (MfE, 2020a).
Communities’ vulnerabilities are dynamic and uneven (high confidence). In Australia, 435,000 people in remote areas face particular challenges (CoA, 2020e). Some groups do not have the time, resources or opportunity to participate in formal adaptation planning as it is currently organised (Victorian Council of Social Service, 2016; Tschakert et al., 2017; Mathew et al., 2018). Linguistically diverse groups can be disadvantaged by social isolation, language barriers and others’ ignorance of the knowledge and skills they can bring to adaptation (Shepherd and van Vuuren, 2014; Dun et al., 2018) (11.1.2). Social, cultural and economic vulnerabilities, biases and injustices, such as those faced by many women (Eriksen, 2014; Parkinson, 2019) and non-heterosexual groups and gender minorities (Dominey-Howes et al., 2016; Gorman-Murray et al., 2017), can deepen impacts and impede adaptation; (Fitzgerald et al., 2019; Marshall et al., 2019) (Cross-Chapter Box GENDER in Chapter 18).
