IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/climat/v133y2015i1p113-127.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Adaptation and transformation

Author

Listed:
  • Mark Pelling
  • Karen O’Brien
  • David Matyas

Abstract

Transformation as an adaptive response to climate change opens a range of novel policy options. Used to describe responses that produce non-linear changes in systems or their host social and ecological environments, transformation also raises distinct ethical and procedural questions for decision-makers. Expanding adaptation to include transformation foregrounds questions of power and preference that have so far been underdeveloped in adaptation theory and practice. We build on David Harvey’s notion of activity space to derive a framework and research agenda for climate change adaptation seen as a political decision-point and as an opportunity for transformation, incremental adjustment or resistance to change in development pathway. Decision-making is unpacked through the notion of the activity space into seven coevolving sites: the individual, technology, livelihoods, discourse, behaviour, the environment and institutions. The framework is tested against practitioner priorities to define an agenda that can make coherent advances in research and practice on climate change adaptation. Copyright Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2015

Suggested Citation

  • Mark Pelling & Karen O’Brien & David Matyas, 2015. "Adaptation and transformation," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 133(1), pages 113-127, November.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:climat:v:133:y:2015:i:1:p:113-127
    DOI: 10.1007/s10584-014-1303-0
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1007/s10584-014-1303-0
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s10584-014-1303-0?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Warren, Mark, 1992. "Democratic Theory and Self-Transformation," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 86(1), pages 8-23, March.
    2. Elizabeth Shove, 2010. "Beyond the ABC: Climate Change Policy and Theories of Social Change," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 42(6), pages 1273-1285, June.
    3. Geels, Frank W., 2002. "Technological transitions as evolutionary reconfiguration processes: a multi-level perspective and a case-study," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 31(8-9), pages 1257-1274, December.
    4. Chambers, R. & Conway, G. R., 1991. "Sustainable rural livelihoods: Practical concepts for the 21st century," IWMI Books, Reports H032821, International Water Management Institute.
    5. Miriam Teschl & Flavio Comim, 2005. "Adaptive Preferences and Capabilities: Some Preliminary Conceptual Explorations," Review of Social Economy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 63(2), pages 229-247.
    6. W. Neil Adger & Tara Quinn & Irene Lorenzoni & Conor Murphy & John Sweeney, 2013. "Changing social contracts in climate-change adaptation," Nature Climate Change, Nature, vol. 3(4), pages 330-333, April.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Galvin, Ray, 2018. "‘Them and us’: Regional-national power-plays in the German energy transformation: A case study in Lower Franconia," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 113(C), pages 269-277.
    2. David Ockwell & Joanes Atela & Kennedy Mbeva & Victoria Chengo & Rob Byrne & Rachael Durrant & Victoria Kasprowicz & Adrian Ely, 2019. "Can Pay-As-You-Go, Digitally Enabled Business Models Support Sustainability Transformations in Developing Countries? Outstanding Questions and a Theoretical Basis for Future Research," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(7), pages 1-21, April.
    3. Randelli, Filippo, 2015. "The Role Of Consumers In The Transition Towards A Sustainable Food Supply. The Case Of Gruppi Di Acquisto Solidale (Solidarity Purchasing Groups) In Italy," International Journal of Food and Agricultural Economics (IJFAEC), Alanya Alaaddin Keykubat University, Department of Economics and Finance, vol. 3(4), pages 1-12, October.
    4. Seyfang, Gill & Gilbert-Squires, Amber, 2019. "Move your money? Sustainability Transitions in Regimes and Practices in the UK Retail Banking Sector," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 156(C), pages 224-235.
    5. Watson, Matt, 2012. "How theories of practice can inform transition to a decarbonised transport system," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 24(C), pages 488-496.
    6. Ford, Rebecca & Walton, Sara & Stephenson, Janet & Rees, David & Scott, Michelle & King, Geoff & Williams, John & Wooliscroft, Ben, 2017. "Emerging energy transitions: PV uptake beyond subsidies," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 117(C), pages 138-150.
    7. Steven Bernstein & Matthew Hoffmann, 2018. "The politics of decarbonization and the catalytic impact of subnational climate experiments," Policy Sciences, Springer;Society of Policy Sciences, vol. 51(2), pages 189-211, June.
    8. Burchell, Kevin & Rettie, Ruth & Roberts, Tom C., 2016. "Householder engagement with energy consumption feedback: the role of community action and communications," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 88(C), pages 178-186.
    9. Fábio T. F. Silva & Alexandre Szklo & Amanda Vinhoza & Ana Célia Nogueira & André F. P. Lucena & Antônio Marcos Mendonça & Camilla Marcolino & Felipe Nunes & Francielle M. Carvalho & Isabela Tagomori , 2022. "Inter-sectoral prioritization of climate technologies: insights from a Technology Needs Assessment for mitigation in Brazil," Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies for Global Change, Springer, vol. 27(7), pages 1-39, October.
    10. John A. Mathews, 2020. "Schumpeterian economic dynamics of greening: propagation of green eco-platforms," Journal of Evolutionary Economics, Springer, vol. 30(4), pages 929-948, September.
    11. Wiegand, Julia, 2017. "Dezentrale Stromerzeugung als Chance zur Stärkung der Energie-Resilienz: Eine qualitative Analyse kommunaler Strategien im Raum Unna," Wuppertaler Studienarbeiten zur nachhaltigen Entwicklung, Wuppertal Institute for Climate, Environment and Energy, volume 11, number 11.
    12. Oliver Wagner & Thomas Adisorn & Lena Tholen & Dagmar Kiyar, 2020. "Surviving the Energy Transition: Development of a Proposal for Evaluating Sustainable Business Models for Incumbents in Germany’s Electricity Market," Energies, MDPI, vol. 13(3), pages 1-17, February.
    13. Jordi Molas-Gallart & Alejandra Boni & Sandro Giachi & Johan Schot, 2021. "A formative approach to the evaluation of Transformative Innovation Policies [The Need for Reflexive Evaluation Approaches in Development Cooperation]," Research Evaluation, Oxford University Press, vol. 30(4), pages 431-442.
    14. Filippo Corsini & Rafael Laurenti & Franziska Meinherz & Francesco Paolo Appio & Luca Mora, 2019. "The Advent of Practice Theories in Research on Sustainable Consumption: Past, Current and Future Directions of the Field," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(2), pages 1-19, January.
    15. Capellán-Pérez, Iñigo & Campos-Celador, Álvaro & Terés-Zubiaga, Jon, 2018. "Renewable Energy Cooperatives as an instrument towards the energy transition in Spain," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 123(C), pages 215-229.
    16. Funcke, Simon & Bauknecht, Dierk, 2016. "Typology of centralised and decentralised visions for electricity infrastructure," Utilities Policy, Elsevier, vol. 40(C), pages 67-74.
    17. Pigford, Ashlee-Ann E. & Hickey, Gordon M. & Klerkx, Laurens, 2018. "Beyond agricultural innovation systems? Exploring an agricultural innovation ecosystems approach for niche design and development in sustainability transitions," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 164(C), pages 116-121.
    18. Pradeep Racherla & Munir Mandviwalla, 2013. "Moving from Access to Use of the Information Infrastructure: A Multilevel Sociotechnical Framework," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 24(3), pages 709-730, September.
    19. Arman Avadikyan & Patrick Llerena, 2009. "Socio-technical transition processes: A real option based reasoning," Working Papers of BETA 2009-21, Bureau d'Economie Théorique et Appliquée, UDS, Strasbourg.
    20. Surya Gyawali & Sudarshan Raj Tiwari & Sushil Bahadur Bajracharya & Hans Narve Skotte, 2020. "Promoting sustainable livelihoods: An approach to postdisaster reconstruction," Sustainable Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 28(4), pages 626-633, July.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:spr:climat:v:133:y:2015:i:1:p:113-127. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.