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Changes in climate and climate variability have an effect on people's behaviour around the world, and public institutions have an important part to play in influencing our ability to respond to and plan for climate risk. We may be able to reduce climate risk by seeking to mitigate the threat on the one hand, and by adapting to a changed climate on the other. Another theme of the book is the integrated role of adaptation and mitigation in framing issues and performing analyses. Adaptation costs fall most heavily on the poor and special attention needs to be paid to adaptation by the poorest populations. An integrating framework is also presented to provide the context for an expansive typology of terms to apply to adaptation. The 12 papers collected here use methods from a variety of disciplines and focus on different time frames for decision making, from short term to the very long term. Readership: Technically trained readers familiar with the policy issues surrounding climate change and interested in learning the scientific underpinnings of issues related to societal adaptation.
Societal adaptation to climate variability and change - an introduction, S. Kane, G. Yohe; cautionary tales - adaptation and the global poor, R.W. Kates; smallholder maize production and climatic risk - a case study from Mexico, H. Eakin; Pacific salmon fisheries - climate information and adaptation in a conflict-ridden context, K.A. Miller; reducing vulnerability to climate variability in Southern Africa - the growing role of climate information, M. Dilley; linking adaptation and mitigation in climate change policy, S. Kane, J.F. Shogren; adaptation and the guardrail approach to tolerable climate change, G. Yohe, F.L. Toth; the impacts of climate variability on near-term policy choices and the value of information, R.J. Lempert, et al; climate variability, climate change and water resource management in the Great Lakes, R.C. de Loe, R.D. Kreutzwiser; adaptation in Canadian agriculture to climatic variability and change, C.R. Bryant, et al; adaptation - sensitivity to natural variability, agent assumptions and dynamic climate changes, S.H. Schneider, et al; an anatomy of adaptation to climate change and variability, B. Smit, et al; irreversibility, uncertainty and learning - portraits of adaptation to long-term climate change, J. Reilly, D. Schimmelpfennig.
