WG3: Coherent policies for adaptation to cross-sectoral, cascading climate impacts

Leaders: Dr Hanne Knaepen & Katy Harris

WG3 brings together political scientists that are developing and analysing policies that deal with adaptation to climate change but also systemic risks and resilience building. The focus of WG3 is to collect and understand the degree to which cross-sectoral cascading climate impacts and especially responses to them are conceived at EU level but also especially at EU Member State level and in other COST countries and NNCs. There are large differences in the degree to which cascading climate impacts are acknowledged and represented in the different countries and the networking will yield important insights how different political backgrounds affect the design and uptake of adaptation policies to these cross-sectoral cascading climate impacts.

Therefore, the coordination and networking of WG3 is strongly needed to better understand and evaluate the policies that exist and are planned. Moreover, through the interaction with WG1 and WG2, the latest information about emerging crosssectoral, cascading climate impacts will highlight new fields of policy action such as a focus on adaptation pathways that combine and harmonise efforts to address cross-sectoral climate impacts. WG3 will also focus on assessing which aspects of cascading climate impacts are well covered and which are still unknown or known but for which responsibilities are not clarified (e.g. there is no clear policy structure for dealing with global timber supply chains, they are affected by trade policies but also nature conservation and climate policies).

Likewise, development policies can affect a wide range of cross-sectoral cascading climate impacts in very different ways. Therefore, ultimately, WG3 will foster the compilation and evaluation how policies for coping with cross-sectoral cascading climate impacts can be designed in a coherent way and which policies are actually contradicting themselves or even leading to maladaptation and increases in system risks. The COST networking tools in WG3 will foster the compilation and assessment of different policies that are responding to cross-sectoral, cascading climate impacts and systemic risks and resilience.