Adaptation to climate change is a new challenge for development policy makers and practitioners. As future weather patterns become increasingly uncertain, communities in the developing world need to be able to respond and adapt. Uncertain Futures turns the focus of development onto adaptive capacity, through which communities are able to make changes to their lives and livelihoods in response to emerging climate change. The book reflects on unfolding understandings of adaptive capacity and asks: how can local communities access the assets and knowledge they need to cope with climate change? How do their relationships, characterized by power and gender inequalities, prevent them from controlling the resources needed for adaptation? How can interventions move beyond the local and specific to promote networks and governance that support vulnerable communities?

Uncertain Futures argues that as greenhouse gas emissions continue to accumulate, a "business as usual" approach to development practice is increasingly inadequate and the importance of securing adaptive capacity becomes more urgent. Uncertain Futures examines this challenge, and invites readers to rethink development policy and practice in terms of how adaptive capacity can be best supported.

This book should be read by the staff of donor agencies, policy makers, NGO practitioners, academics and students of development studies and the environment.

Table of Contents:

Preface
About the author
1. Community-based adaptation and development practice
Uncertain futures
Adaptation unpacked
Adaptive capacity and development practice
Adapting development
2. Understanding adaptive capacity
Resilience and adaptation
Defining adaptive capacity
Resilience thinking
Complexity
Thresholds and slow variables
Adaptive cycles
Resilience thinking for adaptive capacity
Dealing with complexity
Key messages from resilience thinking
3. Unpacking adaptive capacity
Supporting processes of change
Three dimensions of support for adaptive capacity
The three dimensions – unpacked
Power sharing
Knowledge and information
Experimentation and testing
Supporting adaptive capacity
4. Adapting development – in practice
Rights-based approaches: lessons for adaptive capacity
Lesson 1: participation should be transforming
Lesson 2: adaptive capacity is a political issue
Lesson 3: the state must be accountable
Lesson 4: the law may be a tool for adaptive capacity
Consensus building: sharing power and knowledge
Participatory Action Plan Development (PAPD)
Case study: PAPD in the Bangladesh charlands
Pathways to power sharing
Participatory technology development: experimentation and testing in practice
Case study: participatory technology development in Zimbabwe
Power-sharing approaches and PTD
Adapting development practice
5. Uncertain futures
Livelihood transitions and transformations
Living in the future
Adapting development
References
Index