For public adaptation situations, in which public actors wish to influence the adaptation of others adaptive capacity indicators are applicable. These summarise the generic potential capacity of social groups to adapt based on a wide variety of socio-economic variables ranging from aggregate variables such as GDP, literacy rates, education level to household-level variables such as income, age structure, etc (Hinkel, 2012).
It is important to note that adaptive capacity indicators of both of these types only provide a rough, high-level and rapid assessment of the potential and generic capacity of actors threatened by climate change. Whether this potential capacity is realized in the context of a specific climate threat depends on many contextual, in particular institutional and cognitive factors.
See also the Toolbox section on Indicators of adaptive capacity.
Read more in the Toolbox under the following category:
| Indicators of adaptive capacity |
weADAPT case studies identidied for task 'Adaptive capacity indication' 1
|
Case studies on adaptive capacities of local institutions
Institutional capacities at local levels play a crucial role in shaping adaptation. In the past, local institutions have shaped how rural communities respond to environmental challenges. Strong institutional mechanisms will be crucial for adaptation, and the impacts of future external interventions... | |
|
Participatory multi-level vulnerability assessment in northern Mali: Understanding socio-ecological complexity
Using a participatory approach across levels and genders, this project explored the vulnerability of livestock- and forest-based livelihoods to climate variability and change in Lake Faguibine, northern Mali, where drastic ecological, political and social changes have occurred. Lake Faguibine has been almost completely dry since the droughts of the 1970s and has transformed from a water-based to a forest ecosystem... | |
|
1 note that this does not imply that the Mediation Integrated Methodology was used in these cases. | |
This section is based on the UNEP PROVIA guidance document | 
|
| 1. | You want to assess vulnerability. | |
| 2. | You want to generate knowledge on capacity. | |
| 3. | The adaptation situation is public. |
