According to the recently released National Climate Assessment (NCA), climate change will disproportionally impact the health of the most vulnerable communities in Central Texas (Melillo, 2014). Exactly how climate change will impact these populations is unclear (Measham, 2011; Martens, 2014). Nationwide, there are few examples of cities looking at the impacts of climate change on existing public health issues and vulnerable communities. The NCA, Austin/Travis County Community Health Assessment (CHA) and Community Health Improvement Plan (CHIP), broadly identifies vulnerable communities as children, the elderly, the sick, the poor, and some communities of color (Melillo, 2014: Luber, 2009). The 2014 release of the NCA, in addition to the 2013 completion of the CHA and CHIP, provides an opportunity to compare current public health issues with projected changes in climate. The deductive process starts with a review of the CHA and CHIP to identify issues that are directly impacted by hotter and longer heat waves including a lack of physical activity, a decrease in mobility, and greater social isolation. These issues are then compared to likely climate scenarios for Austin in the coming century. For Austin, climate scientists project longer and hotter heat waves and higher overnight average temperatures. The results of the process are a hypothetical framework and specific actions to incorporate increasing temperatures into short-term and long-term health improvement planning. Comparing the NCA and CHA/CHIP reveals that an increase in intensity and duration of heat waves will make it especially dangerous for vulnerable communities who already struggle with health issues sensitive to heat such as obesity, respiratory ailments, and social isolation (Martens, 2014). Further analysis finds that the health implications of climate change come down to three broad topics: outdoor physical activities, lack of access to healthcare facilities, and isolation. Austin’s increasing temperatures and growing population means that more resources and efforts are needed to ensure the safety of all Austin residents. In this thesis, I put forth a hypothetical decision-making framework that prioritizes the allocation of resources to advance Austin’s pathway to climate resiliency. In addition, tools and actions are proposed to increase the climate resilience of the most vulnerable community members in Austin. / text

No description available.

There is a debate within the field of policy studies whether disasters are drivers of policy reforms, as encapsulated by the disaster-reform hypothesis. Since the disaster rate for extreme weather events are increasing in frequency and severity due to climate change, it is of high relevance to study if these disasters have any effect on climate polices. The aim of this thesis is therefore to empirically explore if there are any discernible global trends of disasters preceding a subsequent increase in Climate resilient development (CRD) policies and to show the variation of “effect lag” between income groups and regions. The research design operationalises the most severe disasters through “milestone events” and creates a CRD index by the arithmetical mean of sustainable development, climate adaptation, and climate mitigation. The results show a proportional share of countries experienced an effect lag of 1-3 years after their milestone events, while a large incidence of HIC and LMIC countries had a lag of 4-6 years. This explorative thesis has provided a research design and results on CRD, previously undescribed, that suggests several pathways for future studies such as interesting samples for case studies and alternative designs to the operationalisation of concepts.

Gothenburg, Sweden's second-largest city, faces significant environmental challenges due to climate change and risks from rising sea levels. These challenges include eutrophication, spread of environmental toxins, invasive species, and habitat loss. Gothenburg needs more transformative responses, shifting towards adopting water environment changes rather than against it, a concept gaining global traction. This project goaling to making a climate-responsive urban planning to save Gothenburg from lost in economy, ecology, and residents' well-being due to sea level rise. The city is transitioning from a self-centered development approach to one that emphasizes functional ecosystems. This shift includes implementing a multi-scale network of blue-green infrastructures by four methods which are: 1) Improve urban water system; 2) Constructed wetland; 3) Build green road network; 4) Create shore parks for residents. These infrastructures not only maintain the city's water supply system but also create water buffer wetlands, dynamic dykes, and flood bypasses enhancing water environment control. They use low-impact ecological methods for urban runoff regulation and provide ecological and recreational spaces along city-center riverbanks, achieving efficient land use in density city center.

Global food systems are facing a grand challenge due to daunting food security targets, risk vulnerabilities (e.g., COVID-19 crisis), internal unsustainability regarding resource use and contribution to environmental degradation (e.g., GHG emissions, land degradation and biodiversity loss). Such a situation demands a transformation of the global food system towards more local, alternative, community, and sustainable food systems. Past studies of the food system have shown that major advances toward socio-environmental sustainability can be achieved through the application of technology and the push for innovation. Therefore, since water is at the center of all food system challenges this study focused on climate-resilient water innovation, which includes using hydroponics, aeroponics or aquaponics technologies within a Controlled Environment Agriculture (CEA) to bring about this change. This qualitative study was undertaken to uncover the individual, institutional, technological, and farm/organizational factors that influenced the adoption of such climate-resilient water technologies. Additionally, it also involved investigating the individual construals and their relation to sustainable water innovation adoption. The study was able to discover new constructs, namely- sustainability ethos, individual construals, land/soil characteristics, location of urban farm, farm size bias, inter-provincial variation, complex systemic technologies, localization, and all-year-round production, that act as barriers and facilitators to sustainable water innovation adoption. Finally, developed a sustainable water innovation adoption model using an inductive and deductive approach that can be used by technology providers, the government and policy institutions for insightful decision-making with respect to water innovation in the Canadian agri-food sector.

This thesis addresses the socio-cultural configurations in Liberia in relation to climate resilient development and feminist foreign policy carried out by the Embassy of Sweden in Monrovia. It builds on the intention to explore potential points of integration between the feminist foreign policy with the construction of climate adaptation capacity. Research on climate adaptation actions demonstrates the need to engage more deeply with vulnerability contexts and embed the implementation process in local practice, value and experience. This study explores Liberian society as a case study to examine how feminist foreign policy and climate resilient development can be incorporated fit to the socio-cultural configurations. Methodologically, the study adopts an ethnographic framework. It draws on Butler’s performative notion of gender (1990, 1999, 2007) and ecological masculinities developed by Hultman and Pulé (2021) along with theories of environmental femininity by Bob Pease (2019). Empirically, the study is based on fieldwork in the form of participant observation, ethnographic interviews and document analysis.The results suggest that socio-cultural configurations are permeated by a patriarchal structure with traditional beliefs that householding tasks are linked to female obligations, leading to a disparity in responsibilities and accessibility to cultural activities. Stereotypical notions of masculinity are based on heteronormative assumptions that men should demonstrate dominance, self-reliance, and restrain emotions. The empirical work signifies that Liberian norms of masculinity lead to a reluctance to cooperativeness, block societal development and lead to unnecessary individual suffering. The culture is concluded to be centered around men, while women take a larger workload in key societal activities. Citizens experience that the state doesn't recognize them as equal participants, therefore forfeiting the opportunity to foster vital social capital that could enhance both state legitimacy and the effectiveness of public service delivery. The results illustrate the importance of considering citizens of marginalized areas as stakeholders in decision-making to enable engagement in development processes. Citizens from marginalized areas have their own underlying logic and views of the world. The thesis concludes that the socio-cultural configurations not just produce possible integration between climate resilient development and feminist foreign policy, but even forces the two to be pursued as interdependent processes. Advancing climate resilient development and feminist foreign policy in an integrated manner is thought to increase each other’s effectiveness and achieving them is possible when interdependence is leveraged. This thesis argues that the inauguration of female leadership and changing the perception of what masculinity stands for are the most distinctive points of integration in Liberian socio-cultural configurations. The thesis concludes seven possible procedures for the Embassy of Sweden in Monrovia to achieve climate resilient development aligned with the existing feminist objectives: 1. Include landownership in female empowerment strategies. 2. Transform masculinity normsthrough consultation-groups. 3. Focus on family configurations. 4. Work with religious leaders. 5.Embed policies in informal networks. 6. Encourage female-centered cultural activities and 7. Benefiton the knowledge of grassroots organizations to adopt an ethnographic approach. / Det här examensarbetet behandlar sociokulturella konfigurationer i Liberia och undersöker hur de kan relateras till klimatresilient utveckling och den feministiska utrikespolitik som bedrivs av Sveriges ambassad i Monrovia. Arbetet utforskar potentiella integrationsmöjligheter mellan feministiska utrikespolitik och lokal anpassning till klimatförändringar. Tidigare forskning om klimatanpassningsåtgärder visar behovet av att engagera sig i utsatta områden och förankra implementeringsprocessen i lokala erfarenheter, värderingar och beteendemönster. Med det i åtanke intenderar studien att undersöka det liberianska samhället som en fallstudie för attanalysera hur feministisk utrikespolitik och klimatresilient utveckling kan integreras med sociokulturella konfigurationer. Metodologiskt antar studien ett etnografiskt förhållningssätt där det empiriska arbetet består av fältarbete i form av deltagande observation, etnografiska intervjuer och dokumentanalys. Det teoretiska ramverket på Butlers performativa föreställning om kön (1990,1999, 2007), ekologiska maskuliniteter formulerade av Hultman och Pulé (2021) och teorier om miljöfeminism av Bob Pease (2019).Resultaten illustrerar att de sociokulturella konfigurationerna genomsyras av en patriarkal struktur som innefattar traditionella ideér om att hushållssysslor är kopplat till kvinnligt åliggande, vilket i förlängningen leder till skillnader i ansvarstagande för samhälleliga aktiviteter. Stereotypa föreställningar om maskulinitet bygger på heteronormativa antaganden om att män bör visa dominans, självtillit och emotionell tillbakadragenhet. Det empiriska arbetet påvisar att liberianska maskulinitetsnormer leder till en motvilja mot samarbete, blockerar samhällsutveckling och bidrar till onödigt lidande både för män och kvinnor. Kulturen anses vara centrerad kring män, medan kvinnor tar en större arbetsbörda i flertalet viktiga samhällsfunktioner. Resultaten visar också att medborgare upplever att staten inte ser dem som likvärdiga deltagare i samhällsprocesser. Därmed försummas en möjlighet att skapa socialt kapital som kan främja statens legitimitet och effektivitet i offentliga tjänster. Resultaten antyder att medborgare från marginaliserade områden har en egen bakomliggande logik och syn på världen. Dessa medborgare bör betraktas som viktiga intressenter i beslutsfattande för att möjliggöra engagemang i utvecklingsprocesser. Arbetet drar slutsatsen att de sociokulturella konfigurationerna inte bara producerar en möjlighet för integrering mellan klimatresilient utveckling och feministisk utrikespolitik, utan även tvingar de att implementeras som två ömsesidigt beroende processer. Att främja klimatresilient utveckling och feministisk utrikespolitik på ett integrerat sätt anses öka varandras effektivitet och att uppnå dem är möjligt först när beroendet utnyttjas. Arbetet framhåller att en ökning av kvinnliga ledare och att förändra bilden av vad maskulinitet innebär är distinkta möjligheter för att integrera klimatresilientutveckling och feministisk utrikespolitik i de liberianska sociokulturella konfigurationer. Arbetetringar in sju möjliga riktlinjer för Sveriges ambassad i Monrovia för att uppnå klimatresilientutveckling med befintliga feministiska mål:1. Inkludera markägande i strategier för jämställdhet. 2. Ändra maskulinitetsnormer genom konsultationsgrupper. 3. Fokusera på familjekonfigurationer. 4. Arbeta med religiösa ledare. 5.Förankra policies i informella nätverk. 6. Främja kvinnocentrerad kulturverksamhet och 7. Antag ett etnografiskt förhållningssätt i samråd med gräsrotsorganisationer.