A multi-level perspective on learning about climate change adaptation through international cooperation

Joanne Vinke-de Kruijf and Claudia Pahl-Wostl

Environmental Science & Policy, 2016, vol. 66, issue C, 242-249

Abstract: International cooperation and learning may accelerate climate change adaptation and help countries and regions to adapt more effectively and efficiently. Recognizing the importance and opportunities for mutual learning and knowledge transfer, international and supranational organizations, such as the European Commission, have put programmes for international cooperation in place. This paper presents and tests a framework for assessing multi-level learning outcomes of such international cooperation processes and the conditions that produce these outcomes. The framework distinguishes between: (1) group learning by individual process participants; (2) organizational learning by organizations represented in the process; and (3) network and societal learning by actors external to the process. We verify the analytical potential of the framework by comparing learning by six partners in an adaptation-oriented European cooperation project. The project scores rather high on group learning with participants learning from and – to a lesser extent – also with each other. Learning by partner organizations varied and was generally less whereas learning by external actors was very limited. The case study confirms our expectation that learning outcomes are produced by combinations of partner-specific, process-specific and process-external conditions. The presented framework and insights can be used to stimulate learning in and from international cooperation processes.

Keywords: Learning; Social learning; Knowledge utilization; Climate change adaptation; International cooperation; Configurational analysis (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2016
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1462901116303926
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:enscpo:v:66:y:2016:i:c:p:242-249

DOI: 10.1016/j.envsci.2016.07.004

Access Statistics for this article

Environmental Science & Policy is currently edited by M. Beniston

More articles in Environmental Science & Policy from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().