Governance of adaptation includes how processes, institutions and actors across different scales (international, national, sub-national and local), and sectors interact with each other and within themselves for decision making, implementation and delivery of adaptation solutions. While adaptation requires a set of actions at local levels, actors involved in adaptation governance including public and private actors need to scale up effective interventions that require governance approaches at higher jurisdictional levels. This theme attempts to understand the distributional impacts of adaptation decisions and processes taken at different institutional levels and by different actors, within a space of inter-connected pressures.

There are limits to what humans and ecosystems can adapt to, yet these are still poorly understood. A range of limits have been identified (bio-physical, economic, sociocultural) that will influence the effectiveness of the planning and implementation of adaptation options, together with processes and factors that constrain adaptation. Better understanding of constraints and limits can enable societies to adapt effectively.

Fairness in adaptation examines not just the cost and benefit of adaptation actions but also the differential vulnerabilities associated with individual and collective choices taken at different levels of decision-making in the context of present and projected climate change impacts, other social concerns and priorities. This also includes the existing institutional framework that engenders a particular distribution of resources, wealth and power. Climate change compounds the pre-existing vulnerabilities of the already fragile social, economic and political fabric of the society.

An evolved understanding of the causes and the probable impacts of climate variability and hazards have led to innovative, multi-scale and localised solutions by varied stakeholders. The theme encourages an interactive space for conversations between the adaptation sciences and policy and practitioner communities in search of effective and scalable solutions.

The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) defines nature-based solutions as “actions to protect, sustainably manage, and restore natural or modified ecosystems that address societal challenges effectively and adaptively, simultaneously providing human well-being and biodiversity benefits”. These solutions can range from simply protecting natural areas to increasing the genetic diversity of trees to increase forest resilience, all the way to planting new ecosystems to make spaces greener and clean up polluted areas.

Access to adequate finance is a pivotal concern across international, national and sub-national levels. The need to focus on increasing both private and public funding for adaptation is increasingly acknowledged as a crucial step to strengthen resilience of nations against climate change and is particularly important in the context of the more vulnerable global south. The extent of availability of adaptation fund affects the scale and depth of adaptation measures and hence whether or not the funding is available for measures at the local level. The fact that only a minuscule part of climate finance reaches the grassroots level also necessitates catalysing local climate finance.