Voters Can Reward Climate Adaptation Policy

Are policies that contribute to reducing climate vulnerability electorally advantageous? Political science has long studied the politics of carbon dioxide mitigation, but we know less about the political logic of climate impacts. As adaptation lies at the intersection of environmental, social, and disaster policy, its electoral effects are puzzling from a theoretical perspective. We address this gap by studying a program to improve the ability of households to withstand episodes of water scarcity in Mexico City, implemented between presidential cycles. In contrast to conventional forms of social policy, this intervention prioritizes building future resilience instead of immediate material benefits. We take advantage of the means-tested nature of the program to reduce imbalances between treated and control neighbors and estimate a difference-in-differences to evaluate its impact on electoral outcomes. We find that neighborhoods receiving this adaptation policy had, on average, higher levels of support for the party in charge of its implementation at the presidential and gubernatorial levels, compared to similar neighborhoods that did not receive the program. We also posit that reductions in reliance on inadequate water sources are a mechanism that explains this result. Our findings suggest that climate adaptation may be less contentious than mitigation, therefore giving politicians strong incentives to implement them. Moreover, we contribute to the climate politics literature by providing a theoretical framework to understand the political logic of adaptation action, regardless of its specific form or domain.