Building urban climate resilience through community-driven approaches to development: Experiences from Asia

More than a third of the world’s population lives in urban areas in low- and middle-income nations, and it is urban areas in these nations that will see much of the growth in the world’s population over the next decades (United Nations, 2012). Within these nations, there are one billion low-income residents living in urban informal settlements that lack adequate provision for infrastructure and services (Satterthwaite and Mitlin, 2014). It is common for cities to have a third to half of their entire population living in such informal settlements (Hardoy et al., 2001). Those living in these informal settlements are often the most at risk from events like floods, landslides and strong winds, which are likely to become increasingly frequent and severe because of climate change (Bicknell et al., 2009 for many city studies).

While local governments usually have the responsibility of supplying the residents of their city with infrastructure (including paved roads and paths, piped water supplies, connections to sewer and drainage networks and emergency warning systems), in the case of many low-income countries, they lack the financial or technical capacity to do so. Extreme-weather disasters in urban areas can be an indication of failure in infrastructure provision and urban management: almost all deaths from disasters caused by extreme weather are seen in low-income countries (United Nations, 2009, 2011). As climate change increases the frequency and the severity of extreme weather events and hence possible disasters, it is becoming increasingly necessary to take steps to reduce the potential impact of these events by focusing on actions that allow the affected populations to move beyond merely coping to adapting to them. Governments, at the local, provincial and national levels, provide the regulatory and financial framework within which urban investments take place – but, in many cases, this framework excludes the poor, who may not be recognised by official systems and thus are not (legally or institutionally) recognised as residents of the city.

Increasingly, organised groups of the urban poor are challenging this exclusion by taking steps to organise themselves, from the community level through to citywide, national and international networks and federations of community groups. These networked groups across Asia and Africa have gained a measure of financial independence through their members’ savings groups and the larger collective funds they have developed (Mitlin, 2013). These provide the means through which they have been able to access other sources of finance to carry out their own actions to improve infrastructure and housing. In many cases, these organised networks do so with the knowledge, and sometimes support, of local governments, and this support can lead to change at scale through processes of co-production (Mitlin, 2008). While these activities are usually taken to address immediate development needs or reduce disaster risk, these measures often overlap with those needed to address the adaptation deficit – such as provision of drainage and sanitation and improving housing. The process of implementing these measures in turn contributes to their future adaptive capacity, moving their responses beyond coping strategies. As stated in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC, 2012a, p. 18) Special Report on Managing the Risks of Extreme Events and Disasters to Advance Climate Change Adaptation (SREX), “a prerequisite for sustainability in the context of climate change is addressing the underlying causes of vulnerability, including the structural inequalities”.

Figure 1 illustrates the different components of community-based adaptation to climate change, and includes examples for each approach which will be highlighted throughout this paper. These community-driven actions address underlying social, economic and physical drivers of vulnerability, contributing to increased resilience to changing risks. The different approaches are interlinked in their ability to contribute to building resilience to changing risks and potentially lead to transformation by redressing structural imbalances in urban governance. The IPCC Fifth Assessment report recognises that “enabling the capacity of low-income groups and vulnerable communities, and their partnership with local governments, can be an effective urban adaptation strategy” (IPCC Working Group II, Chapter 8, 2014, p. 5). When such capacity building and partnership occurs, it can be the basis for transformation in unequal social structures and power relationships (Dodman and Mitlin, 2011), by addressing some of the challenges to effective urban climate governance. Such alternative approaches should be considered within a wider package of planned adaptation actions implemented by governments, NGOs and the private sector alike.

This paper draws on activities of urban poor groups in Asia, particularly those who are involved in the Asian Coalition for Community Action (ACCA) programme of citywide upgrading, an initiative supported through the Asian Coalition for Housing Rights (ACHR). A case study approach is used, drawing on the author’s own experiences working with organised urban poor groups, on secondary literature through documented case studies of ACCA initiatives and on other activities of the urban poor across Asia (see for example the special issue of Environment and Urbanization, 2012, 24(2) for seven papers discussing the ACCA programme). It also explores the potential offered by community-managed, multi-stakeholder citywide financial platforms, known as community development funds (CDFs), as a tool for financing resilience-building actions, with the participation of local government and other stakeholders, and as a possible future mechanism for funding and implementing climate change adaptation for the urban poor at the city level.

Recognising that the “urban poor” are by no means a homogenous group, this paper specifically considers the activities of those living in informal settlements, which, by virtue of their nature and location, are often very exposed to hazards such as floods, and who have organised around collective activities such as savings groups. Many of the approaches described here are also adopted by other networks of the urban poor in Africa and Asia that seek to achieve pro-poor cities.

The IPCC (2007) defines vulnerability as:

When talking of urban populations, this can be understood to mean the “potential of people to be killed, injured or otherwise harmed by the direct or indirect impacts of climate change”, which can range from extreme weather events to droughts (Satterthwaite et al., 2010, p. 19).

Resilience, in the IPCC’s (2007) definition, is the ability of a system to absorb disturbances, maintain structure and ways of functioning and adapt to stress and change, having similarities to the term as applied in socio-ecological systems, whereby disturbances can create opportunities for innovation and development (Folke, 2006). In the context of complex urban systems, urban resilience has been defined as “the ability of a city or urban system to absorb disturbance while retaining identity, structure and key processes” (Leichenko, 2011, p. 164). However, in urban areas where large parts of the local population lack access to secure tenure, basic services and risk-reducing infrastructure, there may be a need for these structures and processes to advance, learn and change, to address underlying deficits in the process of absorbing disturbances. Some urban-specific resilience frameworks have therefore emphasised the interaction between agents, institutions and systems, which include infrastructure systems and ecosystems (Tyler and Moench, 2012).

A literature review by Bahadur et al. (2013) identified ten key characteristics of climate change resilience, which include effective governance and institutions, community involvement, preparedness and planning, social and economic equity and continual learning. For resilience to be of value when considering social systems, it is necessary for the concept to engage with issues of power, agency, equity and institutions (Bahadur et al., 2013; Friend and Moench, 2013). The ability of communities to withstand external shocks to their social infrastructure, that is social resilience (Adger, 2000, p. 361), should also be taken into account, particularly given the population concentration of urban areas. This paper focuses particularly on the role of urban agents and institutions.

Climate change requires adopting a long-term view, to build the capacity of populations to move beyond merely coping with effects to adapting to long-term uncertainty. Building capacity has been equated to building resilience, by reducing vulnerability and developing ability to respond to and adapt to climate change stimuli and impacts (Osbahr, 2007). Adaptation can take various forms to reduce vulnerability, by controlling the problem, coping with the problem (lessening sensitivity) or avoiding the problem (Few et al., 2007). This can mean either “hard” measures such as building or improving infrastructure, or “soft” measures which focus on social approaches and may be less costly – an example of which is community-based adaptation (Dodman and Mitlin, 2011, Ayers and Forsyth, 2009), or a combination of both, addressing governance frameworks while also improving physical infrastructure. As stated in the IPCC (2012a, p. 18) SREX report:

Yet, in many cities, these actions are not taken, or where they are, they may be focused in middle- or high-income areas or economically strategic areas such as industrial zones or central business districts, meeting the needs of more powerful urban residents and enterprises who can influence city investment priorities.

What obstacles explain the reluctance of some cities to implement adaptation actions? Local governments may lack the capacity to fulfil their responsibilities in supplying the infrastructure, service and urban management needs of a city, which together form the essential framework for reducing risk. This may be a combination of state and market failure. In many cases, it is the poorest, most vulnerable and marginalised residents of the city who do not receive the needed infrastructure and services and thus suffer an adaptation deficit. In some cases, this may be because they are on the fringes of the city – for instance, in poorer, peripheral municipalities in city agglomerations made up of many local government units. In other cases, it is a political choice not to prioritise infrastructure and service provision in informal settlements (Satterthwaite, 2011). The lack of legal tenure in most such informal settlements inhibits their residents’ negotiation for services. Residents may be unable to get onto the voter’s register, as this requires a legal address. Even where the residents of informal settlements can vote, it can still prove difficult to obtain the needed responses. This is a failure of the governance system, whereby the necessary accountability and responsiveness of the state to those in informal settlements (and the vulnerable groups they concentrate) does not exist.

City governments need an understanding of the hazards threatening the city and populations and districts within the city and potential climate impacts. But they may not have access to modelling and technical assessments of potential climate impacts and even when they do, these have uncertainties that make their incorporation into planning and infrastructure investments difficult. There is a role here for local knowledge of historic events and trends to be taken into account, including through community consultation (Archer et al., 2014). City governments also need to communicate hazards and risks effectively to urban populations. In addition, there needs to be a process of identifying, in an inclusive and participatory manner, those who are the most vulnerable to those impacts, both physically and socially, to prioritise adaptation actions. As the impact of climate change may be an exacerbation of existing severe weather events, disaster risk reduction and disaster risk management strategies, as well as communication with at-risk groups of the potential impacts of climate change, are needed.

The uncertainty of the impacts of climate change may act as a barrier to taking action. These factors do not fit in easily within political investment cycles, which may favour decisions to delay action, at no cost and possibly benefits today, but potentially high costs in the future. While urban climate governance refers to ways in which “public, private and civil society actors and institutions articulate climate goals, exercise influence and authority, and manage urban climate planning and implementation processes” (Anguelovski and Carmin, 2011), much of this relates to basic good urban governance and successful urban management, including flexibility, transparency and accountability.

In addition to the above, as the impacts of climate change fall across multiple scales and sectors, in ways which may not align with the division of authority across different levels of government, and which require integration and coordination across municipal and other agencies, there is a need for organisational capacity and coordination (Brown et al., 2012). In light of this, there is therefore a need for “multilevel or multiscale governance”, to bring together “actions, actors, sectors and governance levels” (Leck and Simon, 2012), that is, agents and institutions from both the government and non-government sectors, including community groups, through inclusion of community voices in defining the problem and finding solutions, and mainstreaming community-based adaptation approaches into planning and processes. At the same time, national-level frameworks will shape urban climate governance at the local scale (Corfee-Morlot et al., 2011) and so policy frameworks should facilitate multi-stakeholder and participatory approaches to planning and implementation in urban development and climate change adaptation.

Recognising the constraints which may limit the ability of urban governments to adapt their cities to climate change impacts, there is also a role for local governments to provide a facilitating environment within which urban populations can take adaptation actions of their own. Where the government lacks the capacity to build or invest in large-scale infrastructure, it can play a role in encouraging, informing and facilitating appropriate actions by households, civil society groups and the private sector. This institutional and local governance framework of support in itself represents an adaptive capacity at the urban scale. The following section will illustrate cases where community groups have organised to address their development needs, and in certain cases, local governments have taken steps to provide a supportive framework in a bottom-up approach to multi-level governance, and with this state buy-in, help to achieve change at scale. In the process, adaptive capacity of local groups has increased whilst exposure and sensitivity have been addressed.

The ACCA is a programme enabling and supporting close to 1,000 local initiatives chosen by community organizations that included many that reduce local risk and vulnerability. The ACHR, a network of grassroots groups and NGOs, supports the ACCA initiative in 19 Asian countries, driven by a process of addressing immediate development needs – in turn contributing to resilience (IPCC, 2012b) – through collective actions and partnerships at a local scale. While these actions have largely not been carried out with climate change in mind, in certain cases, disaster risk reduction is an objective. The possibilities offered by these community-driven approaches, working collectively and with the local government’s engagement wherever possible, offer a pathway to building resilience to climate change, and demonstrate how government support, where it is offered, can lead to a scaling up of these actions, for a bottom-up approach to multi-level governance.

The principle behind the ACCA projects is that small amounts of external funding, granted or loaned directly to organised community groups that choose how it is spent, can strengthen community initiatives to upgrade infrastructure and housing, reduce urban poverty and catalyse action on a larger, citywide scale, through synergies with the state (Boonyabancha and Mitlin, 2012). While the ACCA programme provided grants of up to US$15,000 per city for small infrastructure projects across at least five communities, and US$40,000 for larger, housing projects, in many cases, the community groups chose to use these grants as revolving loans, supplementing their existing savings and loans programmes and enabling a larger scale of action (ACHR, 2012). In addition, up to US$3,000 per city was available for activities such as networking and citywide mapping and surveying, carried out by the residents of informal settlements themselves. In many cases, the community groups operating at a city level also have the support of a network or federation at the city or national level, and support NGOs who may provide technical assistance. After five years of implementation of the ACCA programme, by November 2014, the programme was supporting activities in 215 cities, across 19 Asian countries, through 146 big projects and 2,139 small projects (ACHR, 2014). In addition, a process of national and international exchanges had spread learning across the many cities and communities.

The link between supporting community initiatives and city scale was key to ACCA. The support in any city to at least five community initiatives means that community groups have a range of needs to discuss, prioritise and learn from. The ACCA-supported initiatives include an assessment of the needs of the households and communities identified as most vulnerable through community-driven surveys, at both the level of individual communities and at the citywide level. This surveying includes a process of mapping which can be a vital process of identifying key risks, including climate risks and tenure status, and possible actions to address them – serving as a form of vulnerability assessment. Citywide action also gives the process legitimacy through scale, and hence, it is more likely to attract the attention of municipal agencies and garner their support, whether it is in the form of funds, loans of equipment, provision of land for relocation, supply of building materials or technical support (ACHR, 2012). Local governments are alerted to these initiatives, as they see community initiatives happening within their jurisdiction and often building infrastructure that should be their responsibility.

The process also encourages the establishment of citywide financial platforms for collaboration, whereby communities pool a portion of their collective savings into a wider fund for action and provide a mechanism through which other stakeholders may contribute resources to finance community-managed interventions. CDFs have been established in 136 cities, and in many of the cities, the process of fund establishment has been directly linked to ACCA investments (ACHR, 2014). These CDFs complement community-level savings groups, and open up opportunities for scaled-up action.

Small community-driven infrastructure projects can provide an example to drive government action. In the Philippines, the ACCA programme has supported the activities of a number of federations, including the Homeless Peoples Federation of the Philippines (HPFP), which is active across many cities. In Davao City, the SAJUSSA coastal community of 106 households received a loan of US$750 (via the ACCA programme) to build a seawall, to protect the settlement from coastal erosion and hence reduce its exposure. When the community completed the construction of the stretch of seawall, the government stepped in to not only extend the wall further along the coast but to also pave the road leading into the community. In Quezon City, the Talanay Creekside community built their own concrete walkway down a steep hillside which otherwise limited accessibility during heavy rain, and invited the district officials to inaugurate the pathway (Carcellar and Kerr, 2012), demonstrating the effectiveness of the path. In many cases, the upgrading activities undertaken by community groups may not conform to local regulations or have official permission, but are still an improvement on previous conditions and inaction, and can be the basis for revisiting bylaws. Inviting officials to ribbon-cutting ceremonies shows this and opens up the path for engagement with the government on future projects, and negotiation on local building regulations and bylaws which may create barriers to affordability for residents.

In Cambodia, the urban poor are organised into networks and community development funds at the city level, and operate under the umbrella of a national fund known as the Urban Poor Development Fund (UPDF), which also assists communities in providing technical advice and support in negotiations with the state (Phonphakdee et al., 2009). Evictions of informal settlements are a frequent occurrence, as the land demands from rapid development pushes the poor off their land, even marginal sites subject to frequent flooding. Wherever possible, in situ upgrading is preferred to minimise disruptions to well-established social networks, livelihood options and existing investments in the community. However, increasingly, city and provincial governments have been drawn in to negotiations with local communities, and where relocation has been agreed upon, this has, in a number of cases, been to sites provided for free by the government. This addresses insecure tenure as an underlying driver of vulnerability.

In Serey Sophorn City, 30 riverside households were relocated 2 km away to a site given by the local government, with community land title, the first such case in Cambodia (ACHR, 2010). In the case of relocated communities in Serey Sophorn and Kampong Cham, the government also provided infrastructure such as water connections and septic tanks on the site, and assisted with infilling land, reducing risks of flooding and water-borne diseases. The housing was built by the community, with the help of ACCA housing project funds which pass through the UPDF, and the new houses are designed with flooding in mind, raised on stilts to reduce exposure. In Cambodia, the value of government contributions to 10 projects represents US$3.2m, much of this through land contributions – representing significant buy-in by the state into the existing funds of the urban poor, totalling US$444,000, benefiting 660 households directly (and allowing 1,093 to obtain secure tenure) and opening up the door for further negotiations for larger-scale action (ACHR, 2012).

Because of the overlap between climate change adaptation and building resilience to disasters and extreme weather events, adaptation actions should also consider disaster risk reduction and management responses, including damage limitation before an extreme event, immediate post-event response and rebuilding (Satterthwaite, 2011). Disaster risk reduction and response are areas where community participation has a strong role to play, informing and supplementing the actions taken by local government or where there is no local government response, ensuring that risks are minimised. In particular, processes of community mapping and enumerations can ensure that actions to minimise disaster risk are informed by a detailed understanding of the local context and existing capacities. This information-gathering process enables core vulnerabilities of at-risk groups to be identified so that they can prepare and better respond in the aftermath. In certain post-disaster situations, these data are the only information available about the number of affected households and maps of the area, and thus, can be shared with the local government and other first responders to ensure an effective response (Carcellar et al., 2011).

The Homeless Peoples Federation of the Philippines (HPFPI) has years of cumulative experience in responding to disasters and of implementing DRR strategies, working with the support NGO, the Philippine Action for Community-led Shelter Initiatives (PACSII), to address the core vulnerabilities of urban poor communities (Carcellar et al., 2011). Where community surveys identify that financial access is limited, the Federation encourages the establishment of savings groups, building up financial management skills and community inter-lending, producing a safety net of financial resilience. Where the community may lack organisation, the Federation will assist in establishing and registering a local community organisation, as a formal body to facilitate collaboration with local government and access to finance, and networking with other urban poor groups (Carcellar et al., 2011). This general process of empowerment is necessary to effectively reduce exposure arising from high-risk locations and lack of secure tenure, whereby options for upgrading or relocation can be discussed, land for relocation (where necessary) can be identified and purchased and loans provided for housing materials and construction, from ACCA and other sources. In such a way, communities can collectively find solutions which improve their living conditions, financial situation and, in the process, empower themselves to be active agents for change, able to partner effectively with government to implement action on a larger scale.

Returning to the IPCC definition of vulnerability as being determined by exposure, sensitivity and adaptive capacity, these cases demonstrate approaches that go some way to reducing vulnerability, by addressing these three factors. However, achieving this effect on any significant scale requires financial support from local and national governments, if not also external funders (Satterthwaite and Mitlin, 2014) – although there are financial platforms managed by community groups through which such financial support can be channelled.

The ACCA programme, unlike microfinance programmes, channelled finance to community organisations to address collective needs. It supported community-level savings groups and encouraged action at the citywide and national scale through the formation of revolving CDFs, which are accountable to the urban poor and can be used to address the issues they prioritise. The CDFs are formed of contributions from the communities themselves, ACCA seed funds and contributions from other stakeholders, such as local government and the private sector. Each CDF functions as a collaborative platform, bringing together different actors in joint management committees which include local government staff wherever possible (even if local government does not contribute financially to the fund). This process of establishing ties is a path to partnership for more accountable multi-level urban governance through which a variety of urban development challenges can be tackled. These funds address the needs of the urban poor on a larger scale – and their take-up by communities across Asia demonstrate that having an accountable financial system is a need felt by the urban poor (Archer, 2012). In addition to funds at the city scale, they can also operate at a national level, such as the UPDF in Cambodia, the UPDF of HPFP in the Philippines and Clafnet in Sri Lanka (ACHR, 2014).

Networks of the urban poor in cities in Thailand have established CDFs on a large scale, with 62 CDFs operating and 243 being established across the country (Archer, 2012). Many of these have arisen out of Thailand’s national participatory slum-upgrading programme, the Baan Mankong (secure housing) programme, which provides collective loans to low-income communities for upgrading housing with secure tenure – this is now active across 260 towns in Thailand (Boonyabancha, 2005, 2009). The CDFs set up by Thai communities are intended to give community groups financial independence in scaling up the approaches fostered by Baan Mankong, as well as other community initiatives beyond housing. As per the priorities of the CDF members, the funds may be used for various purposes which meet locally identified needs. For example, in the town of Chum Pae of North-East Thailand, funds from the CDF were used to purchase a rice field, ensuring food security for the CDF members.

Community groups in Thailand are also using CDFs as a form of collective risk transfer, by including specific funds for addressing post-disaster recovery (whether natural or human-induced, such as fires), which can provide loans or grants for housing repair or reconstruction (Archer, 2012). Very often, low income households do not have access to insurance coverage, as they lack the necessary paperwork or bank accounts. It is also difficult to set up viable insurance schemes when risks are high and the capacity to pay premiums is low. In these instances, community-managed systems of disaster insurance fill a gap in the formal market. Similarly, for those who cannot access government-provided social security, CDFs can include funds for health (such as contributions to hospital costs), education (such as scholarships or contributions to school costs such as uniforms) and welfare (such as schemes for the elderly), to provide a form of community-managed social welfare for the most vulnerable (Archer, 2012). Thus, these community funds serve to increase the resilience of urban poor groups by addressing the specific needs that have been identified within their communities and ensuring that the most vulnerable members are taken into consideration.

It is also for this reason that communities seek to engage other stakeholders within the collaborative platform of citywide community development funds – to build an understanding of the barriers faced by low-income groups and find joint approaches to resolve them. While the contribution of local government actors may be in the form of provision of land for relocation sites, it can also include technical support and advice, or mediation in disputes. In other cases, a demonstrated approach by community groups may lead to new bylaws, or a relaxation of building regulations such as over-large minimum plot size regulations (ACHR, 2012), in recognition of the financial constraints faced by the urban poor. This transformation towards supportive institutional frameworks is necessary to facilitate the scaling up of action to other vulnerable communities.

Because CDFs are managed by the urban poor, they are accountable to all members for the use of the funds – a way of ensuring that finance is used to meet their needs. These funds can be used directly by the communities, unlike many funds which pass through national and then the local government. CDFs are free of the political barriers which may leave local governments marginalised by central authorities. Given the constraints that local governments can face in accessing national and international sources of financing, and climate adaptation finance in particular, alternative routes to funding local-level action need to be considered. The “systemic barriers” within international climate finance mechanisms make them inaccessible and unaccountable to vulnerable and poor groups, and the funding pots currently available are insufficient to meet the scale of adaptation needs (Smith et al., 2014). However, there is potential for international climate funds to support local governments and local groups through “direct access” mechanisms, and local community funds could act as a viable entry point (Smith et al., 2014; Satterthwaite and Mitlin, 2014), enabling local adaptation priorities to be addressed directly. Similarly, CDF-type mechanisms could be considered as a channel for funds from other sources, including lending institutions. As community groups demonstrate success in their city-level activities, they are empowered to negotiate and leverage further contributions to the funds.

As the examples above have shown, development actions undertaken by community groups will address some underlying drivers of vulnerability arising from inequalities, and in doing so, can contribute to their climate resilience, even where adaptation to climate change is not the primary goal. The citywide scale of their approach, from mapping settlements to implementing infrastructure-upgrading projects, has implications for the broader resilience of the city. Returning to some of the key characteristics of resilience highlighted by Bahadur et al. (2013), the processes of carrying out these initiatives with community involvement can contribute to effective governance, improved preparedness and planning, leading to social and economic equity and opportunities for applying continued learning. Opportunities have been created for organised urban poor groups to engage with local government in partnerships for urban development. As Bahadur et al. (2013, p. 3) recognise, “devolution/decentralising processes and enhancing accountability could yield positive, robust, long-term results” for resilience, even when these actions are not climate-specific. This process builds an institutional framework around which future climate initiatives can be implemented in a manner which considers the needs of the urban poor, fostering improved capacity for adaptation in future and hence more resilient urban actors and institutions.

Adaptation can be seen as a continuum – moving from merely coping and disaster risk reduction to processes of incremental and transformational adaptation, which opens up new political arenas to address risks and inequalities which development has not addressed (Pelling, 2011). Returning to Figure 1, the community-driven initiatives may be at different points of the process, with collective approaches applied by empowered community groups to transfer risks, reduce exposure and vulnerability, prepare for and respond to disasters and increase resilience. These contribute to the potential to transform relationships between urban actors and address the underlying socio-political drivers of vulnerability (Pelling, 2011). However, transformation for effective adaptation requires change at different scales, not only from local populations but also within broader institutional structures at the local, national and international levels, including international climate funds (Bulkeley and Tuts, 2013; Dodman and Mitlin, 2011).

This also means that the question of “adaptation for whom” needs to be considered – planned adaptation actions undertaken by the city may prioritise the needs and interests of the more powerful residents of a city over those with no choice but to live in marginal, exposed areas. As a consequence, climate-related problems must be considered from different viewpoints – as the type of solutions proposed may differ according to who defines the problem and what climate risks they face (Archer et al., 2014). Community-based adaptation arises from indigenous knowledge of locally appropriate solutions to climate variability and extreme events (Ayers and Forsyth, 2009) – in the case of urban informal settlements, this local knowledge may be borne from coping with previous extreme events. However, some politically sensitive adaptation actions will sometimes be required, such as relocating communities to avoid disaster risks, and this will require cities to change the way they currently engage with such vulnerable communities (Bulkeley and Tuts, 2013) and reshape planning frameworks to facilitate deliberative, participatory governance (Ayers, 2011). The actions of community groups illustrated above have sought to open up processes of negotiation and partnership with local authorities. This linking between bottom-up initiatives and the actions of actors “at the top” is important to “consolidate structural transformations” (Manuel-Navarrate and Pelling, 2015, p. 3) which can begin to remedy inequalities.

Within all of this, community capacity and knowledge around climate change must be developed. This knowledge may also be lacking at the level of local or even national government. Such knowledge gaps, and financial constraints, open up the possibility of resources being invested in maladaptive actions by either the state or community actors. However, given the difficulty of obtaining climate models downscaled to the city level, and the inherent uncertainty around climate change, it is important to respond to current climate variability, whilst managing future uncertainty. Alongside this should go a process of raising awareness of the potential impacts of climate change amongst local populations, as well as local government, and capacity building in possible measures to address these impacts in ways which will not create or exacerbate inequities or displace the climate impacts to other areas or groups.

Climate change adaptation in any city is generally seen as a citywide initiative deriving from a citywide risk and vulnerability assessment. But it can also be well served by the aggregation of smaller community-driven initiatives, with the support of local government and other actors in scaling these up, especially if these serve those most at risk. Cities are not homogenous in terms of the distribution and type of climate hazards they face, and the exposure, sensitivity and adaptive capacity of populations. Community-based approaches should be viewed as part of the broader toolbox of adaptation applied at the city scale, and the city governments should provide an enabling environment for such approaches – including participatory planning processes, capacity building of local stakeholders and financing that is accessible and accountable to local groups. An overarching governance and policy framework which supports decentralisation of power to local actors, such as the 74th Amendment of the Indian Constitution, can also incentivise support to community-level institutions and actors (Mani and Wajih, 2014). However, the burden of action cannot be left to organised local groups alone – rather, community-initiated activities can complement and increase the effectiveness of action that is taken by local government and shaped by national frameworks and policies.

There may be limits in the capacity of local governments to implement adaptation actions, and even to provide the basic services, infrastructure and governance framework which are required for building urban resilience. Local governments which seek to provide an institutional framework which is supportive to the urban poor, and may even support, facilitate and inform the actions taken by urban poor groups, are themselves demonstrating adaptive capacity. Sometimes, it is because of the activities of the organised urban poor, or initiation by outside actors such as donors, that local governments have woken up to the possibilities of working in a collaborative manner. This has positive implications for the adaptive capacity of both local government agencies and the community groups engaged in collective action.

Action will lead to resilience through the cumulative contribution of multiple interventions and actions over time, and the ability of individuals and institutions to internalise learning and experience to inform future behaviour, rather than through one specific intervention (da Silva et al., 2012). Action can build on the existing adaptive capacity at multiple levels. Adaptation needs to be locally driven to properly address the vulnerabilities of the local population and to build on existing local knowledge, and community mapping and risk and vulnerability assessments can get local populations involved while simultaneously building their awareness of the risks they face. In this process, community-based organisations can play a key role not only in engaging local groups in this process but also in creating linkages between these groups and local government actors, by sharing information or by engaging local government actors in collaborative platforms such as community development funds. Given the scale of the investment gap in many urban centres, private investment in infrastructure will also be key in urban development, and incentives and safeguards should be in place to ensure this does not displace risk but rather integrates with the needs and initiatives of diverse urban stakeholders, including the urban poor (Smith et al., 2014), to ensure equitable, sustainable and resilient investments.

Organised urban poor groups, themselves, are increasingly able to take action to address their development needs, as identified by community-driven processes of surveying, by building their financial, technical and management capacity. While their actions may not be driven by potential climate change impacts, and as such might not be labelled as community-based adaptation, the outcomes are a greater ability resilience to extreme weather, both physically and socially, and an ability to move beyond merely coping with extreme climate events to preparing and hence adapting to them. Collective actions on a community- and citywide scale are opening up potential avenues for co-production between citizens and the state. As Mitlin (2012, p. 85) states, “[…] addressing climate change requires new forms of relations both between citizens and between citizens and the state”, with a shift from government to governance through the provision of a supportive, transparent and accountable institutional framework.

This paper was originally prepared for and presented at a workshop at the Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research, and discussions during the session provided valuable insights. Any errors remaining are the author’s own.