MEV 025: Unit 01 – Global change vulnerability assessment
UNIT 1: GLOBAL CHANGE VULNERABILITY ASSESSMENT
1.1 Introduction
The Earth's climate and ecosystems are
undergoing rapid transformations due to anthropogenic global changes such as
greenhouse gas emissions, deforestation, and land-use changes. These changes
threaten both natural systems and human societies, particularly vulnerable
populations and regions. Understanding vulnerability—the degree to which a
system is susceptible to or unable to cope with adverse effects—is essential
for effective climate adaptation and sustainable development. This unit
introduces the concept of vulnerability assessment in the context of global
change and its application in social and socio-ecological systems.
1.2 Objectives
- To understand the concept and scope of vulnerability in global
change studies.
- To examine the challenges and opportunities in conducting
vulnerability assessments.
- To explore frameworks for social and socio-ecological vulnerability
analysis.
- To highlight the role of interdisciplinary climate-society research
in addressing global challenges.
1.3 Climate-Society Research
Climate-society research explores the
interactions between climatic processes and social systems. It focuses on how
societies perceive, adapt to, or are impacted by climate variability and
change. This field integrates insights from:
- Climate science (e.g., IPCC projections),
- Social sciences (e.g., risk perception, governance),
- Geography and development studies.
Such research underpins vulnerability
assessments by addressing questions like: Who is vulnerable? Why? To what
threats? And with what coping capacity?
1.4 Definitions, Challenges,
and Opportunities of Vulnerability Assessment
1.4.1 Defining Vulnerability
Vulnerability is commonly defined as “the
degree to which a system, population, or asset is susceptible to and unable to
cope with adverse effects of climate change or other stressors.” It is a
function of three main components:
- Exposure – the extent to which a system is exposed to a hazard.
- Sensitivity – how strongly the system is affected by the exposure.
- Adaptive Capacity – the ability to adjust,
cope, or recover from the impact.
1.4.2 Challenges of
Vulnerability Assessment
Some of the key challenges include:
- Data Limitations: Lack of high-resolution
or localized data.
- Subjectivity: Difficulties in quantifying social aspects like resilience and
perception.
- Dynamic Nature: Vulnerability evolves with time, policies, and socio-economic
factors.
- Multi-Scale Complexity: Local, regional, and
global interactions are often interconnected and hard to isolate.
1.4.3 Opportunities of
Vulnerability Assessment
Despite the challenges, vulnerability
assessment offers several advantages:
- Targeted Interventions: Helps identify priority
areas and populations for policy action.
- Resource Allocation: Supports planning and
budgeting based on risk profiles.
- Community Engagement: Encourages
participatory approaches for co-developing solutions.
- Integration into Planning: Promotes mainstreaming
of climate concerns into development agendas.
1.5 Social Vulnerability
Assessment
Social vulnerability refers to the
susceptibility of individuals and communities to harm due to social, economic,
and political factors. Assessment typically considers indicators such as:
- Poverty and income inequality,
- Access to education and health services,
- Gender and caste dynamics,
- Institutional support and governance capacity.
Tools used may include:
- Social Vulnerability Index (SoVI),
- Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA),
- Surveys and demographic analysis via GIS.
1.6 Assessment of
Social-Ecological Systems
Social-ecological systems (SES) are integrated
systems of ecosystems and human societies with mutual dependencies. Assessing
vulnerability in SES requires:
- Systems Thinking: Recognizing feedback
loops between environmental degradation and human behavior.
- Indicators for Ecosystems: Biodiversity loss,
water availability, land degradation.
- Indicators for Societies: Livelihood diversity,
institutional resilience, social networks.
- Resilience Frameworks: Understanding how
systems absorb shocks and reorganize.
Approaches include:
- Coupled Human-Environment Systems Models,
- Resilience-vulnerability tradeoff analysis,
- Multi-criteria decision analysis (MCDA).
1.7 Let Us Sum Up
- Vulnerability assessment is central to understanding and managing
risks arising from global environmental change.
- It encompasses multiple dimensions—exposure, sensitivity, and
adaptive capacity.
- Social vulnerability assessments help identify marginalized and
at-risk groups.
- Evaluating vulnerability in social-ecological systems promotes
integrated and sustainable policy design.
- Despite methodological challenges, vulnerability assessments
provide actionable insights for climate adaptation and disaster risk
management.
1.8 Keywords (with
Definitions)
- Vulnerability – The degree to which a system or population is susceptible to
harm from environmental or social stressors.
- Exposure – The extent to which a system is subject to a hazard (e.g.,
floods, droughts).
- Sensitivity – The degree to which a system is affected by exposure to hazards.
- Adaptive Capacity – The ability of a
system to adjust, cope, or recover from adverse impacts.
- Climate-Society Research – A multidisciplinary
field examining the interaction between climatic changes and societal
dynamics.
- Social Vulnerability – The susceptibility of
social groups to harm based on socio-economic and institutional factors.
- Socio-Ecological System (SES) – An interconnected
system composed of human society and the surrounding ecosystem.
- Social Vulnerability Index (SoVI) – A composite index used
to quantify the social vulnerability of communities.
- Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA) – A participatory
approach that enables communities to analyze and plan their development
and resilience strategies.
- Resilience – The capacity of a system to absorb disturbance, reorganize, and
continue to function.
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