Embedding Climate Adaptation Principles Into Contemporary Emergency Management Frameworks: a Critical Evaluation of Integrative Planning Approaches
Year: 2021
Type: article
Abstract: The majority of modern emergency management systems were created for event-driven hazards, which are abrupt shocks with distinct beginnings and ends. However, the climate issue is increasingly producing slow-onset, compound, and cascading threats that blur such lines. In order to enhance preparedness, response, recovery, and long-term resilience, this paper critically investigates how fundamental climate adaptation concepts—anticipation, flexibility, redundancy, equity, multi-level governance, and adaptive learning—can be effectively incorporated into emergency management frameworks. The study assesses integrative planning approaches, identifies institutional enablers and barriers, and suggests an operational roadmap for practitioners and policymakers based on an empirically grounded comparative framework and a structured theoretical synthesis (resilience and socio-ecological systems, adaptive governance, and decision-making under deep uncertainty). The argument is supported by international policy tools like the Sendai Framework and IPCC risk assessments, which emphasise the necessity of alignment between adaptation and disaster risk reduction, and it is demonstrated using tried-and-true techniques like Dynamic Adaptive Policy Pathways and Robust Decision Making. A typology of integrative processes (mainstreaming, parallel, and hybrid), an evaluation rubric for assessing the quality of adaptation–emergency integration, and useful suggestions for operationalising anticipatory and equitable action in emergency practice are all included in this work. The final section identifies research goals, such as institutional paths for transformative adaptation, culturally grounded techniques for equality, and metrics for attribution. Keywords: Climate Adaptation, Emergency Management, Resilience, Anticipatory Action, Dynamic Adaptive Policy Pathways, Sendai Framework.
Authors: Chinwendu Ubani, Chinaecherem Okafor, Victor Akachukwu Ibiam
Institution: Federal University of Technology Owerri
Language: English
Subfield: Sociology and Political Science
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
SDG: Climate action
Open Access status: diamond
OpenAlex ID: W7115070976