title: Structural and Psycho-Social Limits to Climate Change Adaptation in the Great Barrier Reef Region.
abstract: Adaptation, as a strategy to respond to climate change, has limits: there are conditions under which adaptation strategies fail to alleviate impacts from climate change. Research has primarily focused on identifying absolute bio-physical limits. This paper contributes empirical insight to an emerging literature on the social limits to adaptation. Such limits arise from the ways in which societies perceive, experience and respond to climate change. Using qualitative data from multi-stakeholder workshops and key-informant interviews with representatives of the fisheries and tourism sectors of the Great Barrier Reef region, we identify psycho-social and structural limits associated with key adaptation strategies, and examine how these are perceived as more or less absolute across levels of organisation. We find that actors experience social limits to adaptation when: i) the effort of pursuing a strategy exceeds the benefits of desired adaptation outcomes; ii) the particular strategy does not address the actual source of vulnerability, and; iii) the benefits derived from adaptation are undermined by external factors. We also find that social limits are not necessarily more absolute at higher levels of organisation: respondents perceived considerable opportunities to address some psycho-social limits at the national-international interface, while they considered some social limits at the local and regional levels to be effectively absolute.
authors.affiliation: Geography, College of Life and Environmental Sciences, University of Exeter, Exeter, United Kingdom.|Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies, James Cook University, Townsville, Australia.
authors.forename: Louisa S
authors.initials: LS
authors.lastname: Evans
authors.affiliation: Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies, James Cook University, Townsville, Australia.|Lancaster Environment Centre, Lancaster University, Lancaster, United Kingdom.
authors.forename: Christina C
authors.initials: CC
authors.lastname: Hicks
authors.affiliation: Geography, College of Life and Environmental Sciences, University of Exeter, Exeter, United Kingdom.
authors.forename: W Neil
authors.initials: WN
authors.lastname: Adger
authors.affiliation: School of Geography, The University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Australia.
authors.forename: Jon
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Barnett
authors.affiliation: Oceana, C/Leganitos, 47, 28013, Madrid, Spain.
authors.forename: Allison L
authors.initials: AL
authors.lastname: Perry
authors.affiliation: Sustainability Research Centre, University of the Sunshine Coast, Sunshine Coast, Australia.
authors.forename: Pedro
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Fidelman
authors.affiliation: Centre for Sustainable Tropical Fisheries and Aquaculture, School of Earth of Environmental Science, James Cook University, Townsville, Australia.
authors.forename: Renae
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Tobin
mesh_terms: D000064:Acclimatization / Q000502:physiology; D000818:Animals; D037421:Anthozoa; D057231:Climate Change