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Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change (2009)

Chapter: Appendix D: Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change

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Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change." National Research Council. 2009. Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12595.
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Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change." National Research Council. 2009. Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12595.
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Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change." National Research Council. 2009. Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12595.
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Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change." National Research Council. 2009. Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12595.
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Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change." National Research Council. 2009. Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12595.
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Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change." National Research Council. 2009. Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12595.
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Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change." National Research Council. 2009. Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12595.
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Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change." National Research Council. 2009. Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12595.
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Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change." National Research Council. 2009. Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12595.
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Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change." National Research Council. 2009. Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12595.
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Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change." National Research Council. 2009. Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12595.
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Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change." National Research Council. 2009. Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12595.
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Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change." National Research Council. 2009. Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12595.
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Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change." National Research Council. 2009. Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12595.
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Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change." National Research Council. 2009. Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12595.
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Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change." National Research Council. 2009. Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12595.
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Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change." National Research Council. 2009. Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12595.
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Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change." National Research Council. 2009. Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12595.
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Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change." National Research Council. 2009. Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12595.
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Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change." National Research Council. 2009. Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12595.
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Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change." National Research Council. 2009. Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12595.
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Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change." National Research Council. 2009. Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12595.
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Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change." National Research Council. 2009. Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12595.
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Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change." National Research Council. 2009. Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12595.
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Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change." National Research Council. 2009. Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12595.
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Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change." National Research Council. 2009. Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12595.
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Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change." National Research Council. 2009. Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12595.
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Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change." National Research Council. 2009. Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12595.
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Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change." National Research Council. 2009. Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12595.
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Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change." National Research Council. 2009. Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12595.
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Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change." National Research Council. 2009. Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12595.
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Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change." National Research Council. 2009. Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12595.
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Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change." National Research Council. 2009. Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12595.
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Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change." National Research Council. 2009. Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12595.
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Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change." National Research Council. 2009. Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12595.
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Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change." National Research Council. 2009. Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12595.
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Appendix D Fundamental Research Priorities to Improve the Understanding of Human Dimensions of Climate Change Paul C. Stern, National Research Council Thomas J. Wilbanks, Oak Ridge National Laboratory Note: The committee commissioned the following discussion paper from the staff and chair of the National Research Council Committee on the Human Dimensions of Global Change. Their views, as expressed below, may not always reflect the views of their committee, the Committee on Stra- tegic Advice on the U.S. Climate Change Research Program, or vice versa. INTRODUCTION The Assignment At the request of the U.S. Climate Change Science Program (CCSP), the National Research Council (NRC) has established a Committee on Strategic Advice on the U.S. Climate Change Sci- ence Program, charged with two tasks. Task 1 was to evaluate progress of the CCSP, and that report was completed in 2007 (NRC, 2007a). Task 2 is to provide advice to CCSP on future re- 167

168 APPENDIX D search priorities, and the key step in this process will be a national workshop on “discovery science” in March 2008. One of the key findings of the Task 1 preliminary assessment was that “our understanding of the impact of climate changes on human well-being and vulnerabilities … is much less developed than our understanding of the natural climate system,” a conclu- sion that echoed findings of the earlier NRC review of the CCSP Draft Strategic Plan (NRC, 2004). For the March workshop, the Committee on Strategic Advice on the U.S. Climate Change Sci- ence Program commissioned two discussion papers on research priorities for climate change science. At least partly reflecting the finding from its first report, one of the papers is focused on underly- ing research priorities for human systems science, including the social sciences. The other is an equivalent summary of priorities related to the natural sciences. As initially articulated by Strategic Advice committee member Charles Kolstad, the assignment was to prepare a “paper on social science priorities” as an input to the workshop, identifying up to 10 top priorities and considering ways to increase the engagement of core disciplines as well as multidisciplinary researchers. Thus de- fined, the priorities were to be focused on relatively basic research rather than applied research. For the assignment, the Committee on Strategic Advice to the U.S. Climate Change Science Program enlisted the assistance of members of the NRC Committee on Hu- man Dimensions of Global Change (CHDGC), who discussed the assignment in detail at the November 2007 CHDGC meeting. The result was a draft paper—an informal communication from the staff director of CHDGC. The draft was discussed at the January meeting of the Strategic Advice committee, which asked that its scope be expanded to add an additional set of research priorities lying closer to the interests of mission agencies in the CCSP and comments on some imple- mentation issues. This paper is the result.

APPENDIX D 169 The Terminology Following the usual practice of CHDGC reports, this paper uses the terms fundamental research and human dimensions rather than basic research and social science: Fundamental Research In conventional usage, basic research is motivated by intellec- tual curiosity and undertaken for the “pure” pursuit of knowledge, not for social aims. Most of the basic research in the social and be- havioral sciences is not motivated by climate concerns, and much of it has no obvious climate applications. Much the same may be true of basic research in chemistry or physics. A different kind of dis- covery science, equally concerned with advancing knowledge, derives its priorities from social needs and related programs (i.e., “purposive basic research”) and has been termed “fundamental” re- search (Shapley and Roy, 1985). The two kinds of research are virtually identical in how they proceed; where they differ is how research questions are developed. We believe that research advice to CCSP is more appropriately considered the latter. Human Dimensions Research Throughout its 19-year history, in its attention to climate change as a special case of global environmental change, the CHDGC has been concerned with human systems drivers of cli- mate change, human systems impacts of climate change, and human systems responses to concerns about or observed effects of climate change. These topics are grounded in the social, economic, and behavioral sciences but are not limited to these sciences. For example, driving forces include technologies, and so understanding them requires engineering expertise. Impacts include effects on hu- man health, food, and energy systems, and understanding the processes producing such impacts requires knowledge and exper- tise beyond the social sciences alone. From the inception of the CHDGC (see NRC, 1992), its reports, which reflect the views of many human dimensions researchers, have identified research pri-

170 APPENDIX D orities for human dimensions of climate change and other kinds of global environmental change in terms of the ends of knowledge— what it is that requires understanding—rather than in terms of an arbitrarily constrained set of academic or disciplinary means for reaching the ends. In this paper, we have adopted an integrative ap- proach rather than a disciplinary approach, as in past NRC reports. Human Dimensions as a Distinct Interdisciplinary Field Many scientists who conduct fundamental research on human– environment interactions conceive of the area as a distinct interdis- ciplinary field or even a distinct discipline. Various names have been proposed for this field, including human ecology, human– environment science (Stern, 1993), and more recently sustainability science (NRC, 1999d) and coupled human and natural systems (e.g., Liu et al., 2007a, b). The pathbreaking NRC report, Our Common Journey (NRC, 1999d), has led to such significant steps as the estab- lishment of a new membership section in the National Academy of Sciences and the creation of a new section in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The editors of PNAS are actively promoting research in sustainability science and refer to it in the journal as a discipline. The National Science Foundation (NSF) has recently established a multidirectorate program on The Dynamics of Coupled Natural and Human Systems to support “quantitative, in- terdisciplinary analyses of relevant human and natural system processes and complex interactions among human and natural sys- tems at diverse scales.”1 A “Road Map” to This Paper The paper is in four parts. It first considers the broader histori- cal context within which priorities have been identified in the past and are identified here. Second, it identifies five substantive priori- ties for fundamental research and three crosscutting fundamental research issues, discusses criteria used to identify the priorities, and identifies the benefits that can result from the research. Third, 1 http://www.nsf.gov/pubs/2006/nsf06587/nsf06587.htm.

APPENDIX D 171 it identifies climate change research priorities focused on human dimensions that are somewhat less fundamental or more action oriented, and shows some of the linkages between fundamental research and these priorities. Fourth, it identifies critical con- straints on progress with these research topics, including but not limited to issues in relating to core disciplines, and offers some possible implementation strategies for overcoming these constraints. THE CONTEXT FOR PRIORITY SETTING There is a relatively rich history of efforts to set priorities for research on the human dimensions of climate change. These efforts provide a strong basis for identifying priorities, and this paper builds on that work. However, the history of responses to past pri- ority-setting exercises shows that careful priority setting alone has made little difference, either in the behavior of agencies that might fund the recommended research or in attracting increased interest from several of the core disciplines in the behavioral and social sciences. These observations suggest that getting research sup- ported and done requires more than identifying priorities. This issue is discussed below under “Critical Constraints.” History of Priority-Related Discussions For almost two decades, committees and panels of the NRC have considered priorities for research on the human dimensions of global environmental change and/or global sustainability. Multiple major studies have helped to provide intellectual foundations for the field, and many others identify research priorities for all or part of the field. Each of these studies involved the participation of large numbers of professionals and stakeholders and produced re- ports that were extensively reviewed by peers. Many of them also included workshops to engage a larger community than the com- mittee membership alone. The research recommendations from these studies provide a valuable base for this paper. An incomplete listing of these studies follows.

172 APPENDIX D Publications primarily developing the intellectual basis for progress include: • The Drama of the Commons (NRC, 2002c) summarized knowl- edge on major questions about the design and operation of institutions for managing common-pool resources band set research directions for the future. • New Tools for Environmental Protection: Education, In- formation, and Voluntary Measures (NRC, 2002b) summarized available knowledge and examined the potential for these measures as supplements to regulatory and economic policy instruments. • Making Climate Forecasts Matter (NRC, 1999b) developed a conceptual base and identified key scientific questions for analyzing the human consequences of seasonal-to-interannual climate variations (e.g., El Niño) and learning how make improved climate forecasting skill more useful. • Our Common Journey: A Transition Toward Sustainability (NRC, 1999d) drew on nearly 375 earlier NRC reports and many other sources to develop a conceptual framework and a set of re- search priorities for sustainability science. • People and Pixels: Linking Remote Sensing and Social Science (NRC, 1998) identified and discussed opportunities for using remotely sensed data in research on human–environment interactions and in social science, presented examples, and devel- oped a Web-based guide to information resources. • Environmentally Significant Consumption: Research Direc- tions (NRC, 1997) conceptualized the link between consumption and environment and identified and illustrated promising research possibili- ties on the causes of environmentally significant consumption. Publications primarily identifying research directions include: • Decision Making for the Environment (NRC, 2005a) iden- tified five areas of high-priority research that can contribute to improved decisions affecting environmental quality. • Population, Land Use, and Environment: Research Directions (NRC, 2005b) reviewed knowledge on interactions between demo-

APPENDIX D 173 graphic and environmental changes mediated by land use and recom- mended research directions in this area. • Implementing Climate and Global Change Research (NRC, 2004) reviewed the strategic plan of the CCSP and identified areas needing additional research investment, including human dimensions, economics, adaptation, and mitigation. • Human Interactions with the Carbon Cycle: Summary of a Workshop (NRC, 2002a) reported on discussions of promising re- search issues linking social science and natural science analyses of the carbon cycle. • Grand Challenges in Environmental Sciences (NRC, 2001) identified eight major scientific challenges, three of which promi- nently featured human systems. • Human Dimensions of Global Environmental Change: Re- search Pathways for the Next Decade (NRC, 1999a) presented a state-of-the-field review and set of research imperatives. • Research Needs and Modes of Support for the Human Di- mensions of Global Change (NRC, 1994a) recommended that NSF support a collection of centers and research teams. • Science Priorities for the Human Dimensions of Global Change (NRC, 1994b) advised NSF on the creation of a policy science program to deal with global change issues. • Global Environmental Change: Understanding the Human Dimensions (NRC, 1992) helped define human dimensions research as a coherent intellectual enterprise and recommended a plan for na- tional research in the area. Since the publication of Our Common Journey (NRC, 1999d), further statements of the fundamental research needs and priorities in sustainability science have continued to appear (e.g., Kates et al., 2001; Clark and Dickson, 2003). Members of the NRC Round- table on Science and Technology for Sustainability and the Forum on Science and Innovation for Sustainable Development2 have been among the sources of research priorities (see also Swart et al., 2002, on critical challenges for sustainability science, and a special issue of PNAS, July 8, 2003, on science in support of sustainability). 2 http://sustainabilityscience.org.

174 APPENDIX D History of Connections with Core Social Science Disciplines Challenges in connecting human–environmental research with core disciplines in the behavioral and social sciences have been an ongoing issue for CHDGC throughout its history, reflected in both committee member appointments and in meeting agendas. For in- stance, most recently in cooperation with the Social, Behavioral, and Economic Sciences Directorate of the NSF, the CHDGC held a half- day symposium on April 25, 2007, on linking environmental research and the behavioral and social sciences. The initial question posed to symposium participants was: What are the core theoretical issues that would motivate social, behavioral, and economic research on environ- mental topics, resulting in improved understanding of environmental phenomena as well as contributions to the core social science fields? The symposium included committee members and staff, par- ticipants from federal agencies, and speakers with ties to six different social and behavioral science disciplines who spoke about developments in those disciplines: political science, sociology, econom- ics, psychology, anthropology, and geography. An underlying question from NSF was why so few social scientists submit proposals to cross- disciplinary programs related to human aspects of environmental issues. Particular problems are perceived in several social and be- havioral science disciplines in which academic reward systems emphasize contributions to established core subfields or theoretical debates rather than to fundamental understanding of societal problems. Disciplinary contributors noted significant obstacles in sociology, psychology, and political science and a split between “ecological” and “environmental” economics; environment is closer to the disciplinary core in anthropology and geography. In general, the discussion sug- gested that involvement by disciplinary social and behavioral scientists can be affected by the agendas and review practices of agencies such as NSF that provide major research support, especially to early-career scientists for whom an NSF grant can be an important career building block. NSF funding criteria and practices, includ- ing the composition of panels that review proposals, can help turn early-career scientists toward a focus either on established “core” disciplinary questions or on fundamental cross-disciplinary questions.

APPENDIX D 175 History of Interest Among CCSP Mission Agencies Historically, except for NSF and a few other isolated programs (e.g., in the health sciences), CCSP agencies have not considered investments in fundamental human systems/human dimensions re- search to be a part of their mission. NSF has supported such research, though usually within broader programs (e.g., decision making under uncertainty and human and social dynamics) in which climate-related research competes with other research that is not motivated by the problems of climate change. In the other CCSP agencies, research that draws on the social sciences is mainly ad- dressed to fairly narrow applications of science to problem solving in such mission-defined fields as environmental regulation, coastal and water resource management, agricultural and forest resource management, and energy supply and use. These programs make use of human dimensions research knowledge and tools, such as envi- ronmental economics, but they seldom invest in improving the fundamental knowledge on which such applications stand. In fact, in most cases, the more fundamental a human dimensions research question sounds, the less likely it has been to attract interest from a CCSP agency other than NSF. In the federal environmental and energy mission agencies, none has more than limited expertise in a few fields of social sci- ence. Consequently, even if such agencies were to decide to support fundamental research on the human dimensions of issues within their purview, it would take them time to develop the staff expertise to set priorities, solicit research, set up review panels, and make full use of research results. This situation raises questions about the likelihood that the fundamental research priorities identified below will be considered relevant to CCSP agencies and program managers or, if they are considered relevant, whether they would be developed effectively. This issue is discussed in greater detail in the last section of this paper.

176 APPENDIX D FUNDAMENTAL HUMAN DIMENSIONS RESEARCH PRIORITIES This section identifies five top substantive research priorities for fundamental research on human dimensions of climate change and three critical crosscutting research priorities. It then discusses how they were arrived at and likely benefits of investments in re- search on them. Substantive Research Priorities 1. Improving the understanding of environmentally significant consumption. For a decade or more, the human dimensions/sustainability science communities have been saying that the single biggest weak- ness in the knowledge base underlying responses to climate change is a lack of understanding about human consumption linked to re- source use (e.g., NRC, 1997, 1999a, 2005a; Kates, 2000). Research on environmental consumption aims to illuminate a fundamental human driver of climate change and to build understanding needed for effective mitigation responses. Part of the research agenda con- cerns understanding individual- and household-level behavior (e.g., what motivates consumption; links among economic con- sumption, resource consumption, and human well-being, including the potential to satisfy basic needs and other demands with signifi- cantly less resource consumption; and the responsiveness of consumption behavior to efforts to change it through information, persuasion, incentives, and regulations). Another part of the re- search agenda concerns decisions in business organizations that affect environmental resource consumption, whether by the or- ganizations themselves, by marketing to ultimate consumers, or through the structure of product and service chains. 2. Improving fundamental understanding of risk-related judgment and decision making under uncertainty. Human re- sponse to climate change depends fundamentally on judgment and decision making under uncertainty, and improved fundamental understanding of these processes continues to be central to the hu- man dimensions research agenda (e.g., NRC, 1992, 1999a, 2005a). Anticipating or guiding human systems responses to both per-

APPENDIX D 177 ceived risks and opportunities related to climate change and its experienced and expected impacts requires a sophisticated under- standing of how people and organizations comprehend incomplete and uncertain scientific information and incorporate, ignore, or reinterpret it in decision making. The argument recently offered that advances in climate science are inherently incapable of doing much to improve the predictability of the probability of large tem- perature changes (Roe and Baker, 2007) helps to underline the need for increased scientific attention to understanding and im- proving human capacity to make wise decisions under significant and continuing uncertainty. The research agenda includes both at- tention to individual cognition and to risk judgments and decision making in groups, organizations, and social institutions. 3. Improving the understanding of how social institutions affect resource use. This topic was identified as one of eight grand challenges in environmental science (NRC, 2001) and has been repeatedly identified as a top-priority area of human dimensions research (e.g., NRC, 1999a; 2005a). The challenge is to understand how human use of natural resources is shaped by “markets, gov- ernments, international treaties, and formal and informal sets of institutions that are established to govern resource extraction, waste disposal, and other environmentally important activities” (NRC, 2001:4). Institutions create contexts and rules that shape the human activities that drive climate change and that shape the real- istic possibilities for mitigation and adaptation. The research agenda includes documenting the institutions shaping these activi- ties from local to global levels, understanding the conditions under which the institutions can effectively advance mitigation and adap- tation goals, and improving the understanding of conditions for institutional innovation and change. This area has a long history in human dimensions research (see NRC, 2002c), and a relatively good scientific infrastructure, but the research questions still re- quire considerably expanded efforts. For example, as noted in a recent special section of PNAS (Ostrom et al., 2007), many policy analysts still believe, despite considerable evidence to the contrary, that global environmental problems can be solved by a single gov- ernance system such as privatization, government control, or community control. Fundamental research on resource institutions

178 APPENDIX D holds the promise of identifying more realistic behavioral models for designing responses to climate change. 4. Improving the understanding of socioeconomic change as context for climate change impacts and responses. Assessing possible human systems impacts of and responses to climate change calls for an understanding of changes in other driving forces affecting those systems over the time horizon of interest in future climates. Examples include demographic change, economic change, and institutional change. Two cases are especially high priorities: technological change and land-use change. a. One of the most significant and most difficult of so- cioeconomic changes to project beyond a period of one or two decades is technological change, which may or may not reduce the rate of climate change, reduce some of its impacts, and of- fer alternatives for adaptation to those impacts. The topic consistently appears on the short list of human dimensions re- search priorities (e.g., NRC, 1992, 1999a). Key practical applications of such research include projecting the rate of implementation of technologies for carbon capture and seques- tration, affordable seawater desalination, much more efficient cooling technologies for buildings, and so forth, and finding ways to speed implementation of desired technologies. Fun- damental research seeks improved understanding of what determines rates of technological innovation and adoption. The research agenda includes studies of the roles of incentives (in- duced technological change), of aspects of organizations that might develop and implement new technology, institutional forces promoting and resisting change, and the potential of both transformational and incremental change (e.g., historical experience with “waves of innovation”). b. A second kind of change, often a key in connecting human dimensions with Earth-system modeling, is land-use change, which reflects interactions between human and natural systems dimensions. This is such a central issue for climate change—related to greenhouse gas emissions, emission sinks, impacts, and responses—that it seems remarkable that a capac- ity does not exist to project such changes beyond a decade or two. Largely because of limitations in the ability to project

APPENDIX D 179 demographic and economic changes over a period of more than several decades, especially at a relatively small scale, along with changes in institutional and policy contexts, how- ever, projections of land-use change into the midterm and further are essentially unavailable at present. Needed research includes decomposing component factors influencing land-use change; improving fundamental understanding of the relationships among population, land-use change, and environment; and linkages across scales (NRC, 1998; 2005b). 5. Valuation of climate consequences and policy responses. No challenge is more profound in climate change mitigation, im- pact assessment, and response evaluation than valuing costs and benefits. To be balanced and comprehensive, judgments must con- front multiple dimensions (e.g., dollars, species, and lives), multiple scales (global, regional, and local), multiple time periods, and multiple affected parties. Currently available theoretical con- structs, tools, and databases are painfully inadequate for meeting this challenge. The research agenda (NRC, 1992, 2005a) includes efforts to improve the validity of formal techniques (e.g., benefit- cost analysis, contingent valuation methods) for choices in which relevant information is uncertain, in dispute, or unknown and in which the benefits and the costs go to different parties. A major emerging issue for formal analysis concerns the dynamic links and feedbacks between climate change mitigation and adaptation. For example, the costs and benefits of adaptation depend on the out- comes of efforts at mitigation, and the dependencies increase with the timescale of the analysis. The research agenda also includes efforts to design and test social processes for evaluating options (e.g., citizen juries, negotiations, public participation mechanisms) and to find ways to integrate formal scientific techniques with such processes in what have been called analytic-deliberative processes (NRC, 1996). A forthcoming NRC report on public participation in environmental assessment and decision making will elaborate on the key questions for research.

180 APPENDIX D Crosscutting Priorities 1. Observations, indicators, and metrics. Discussions of the observational system for climate change science rarely consider the state of observations of the human systems that drive and are affected by climate change. The CCSP strategic plan and the pro- gram itself give extensive consideration to observing and monitoring states of the climate and related environmental sys- tems, but no explicit attention to observing or monitoring human pressures on those systems or human responses to climate change. This helps to explain why data on the human component of the human–climate system are commonly recognized to be inadequate and poorly linked to data on the physical and biological compo- nents of the system (e.g., NRC, 1992, 1999a, 2005a, 2007a). As noted by participants at a CHDGC seminar in 2006 on “Human Dimensions in Major Environmental Observational Systems,” al- though some of these observational systems include human systems variables, they rarely use systematic approaches to deciding what data to collect or how to coordinate among observational systems to en- able integrated global analysis. Federal agencies that collect human systems data rarely do so in ways that allow linking to natural sys- tems data for climate analysis. For example, the Department of Energy’s data on energy consumers in households and the com- mercial sector are not organized so as to be useful for modeling and explaining trends in greenhouse gas emissions, and are not even considered part of the CCSP. This example can be multiplied across other federal agencies that collect data on human actions that drive climate change and that affect human vulnerability to it. Moreover, social data are typically collected in ways (e.g., subdi- vided by political units or nongeographical social categories) that make it difficult to link them to environmental data, for example, with geographic information systems. The CCSP would be well advised to pay systematic attention to identifying key human dimensions indica- tors for climate change science, identifying observational needs for developing the indicators, and developing strategies for linking hu- man systems indicators with physical and biological indicators to enable major advances in the quantitative analysis of human–climate interactions (NRC, 2005a). The present state of the observational sys-

APPENDIX D 181 tem imposes severe limitations on the ability to measure and monitor vulnerability to climate change related to social and economic factors or the adaptive capacity of different regions, sectors, or populations to different kinds of climate-driven events. 2. Nonlinearities, feedbacks, and thresholds in system re- sponses to climate change in a multicausal setting. Human and natural systems are coupled in complex ways that are only begin- ning to be understood (e.g., Liu et al., 2007a). For example, impacts attributed to climate change are not caused by climate change alone: Most of the affected physical, ecological, social, and economic systems are simultaneously affected by a variety of human activities (renewable resource use, infrastructure development in vul- nerable areas, emission of air and water pollutants, etc.) that change at least as much on a generational timescale as climate does. More- over, efforts at mitigation affect the need for adaptation, and vice versa. To understand what to expect from climate change therefore requires understanding of the ways critical systems that support human well-being are affected by multiple stresses (NRC, 2007b) and by human activities in response to expected environmental change. Also critical is improved understanding of nonlinear dy- namics, threshold effects, and the possibility of “tipping points” that shift systems into previously unknown states. Understanding such possibilities is a major challenge for science, but rapidly ex- panding computational capacities, combined with improved collection of data on both the human and environmental aspects of linked systems may enable new and productive kinds of modeling and analysis. 3. Scale dependencies and cross-scale interactions. Issues of geographic and temporal scale pervade climate change science and policy. For example, the effects of national policies for mitigation depend on how they affect smaller units that must implement them and how they relate to policies in other countries. On the conse- quences side, climate change science leaders are reminded at every national workshop that most of these issues are linked inextricably with regions and locations. Climate modelers are urged to “down- scale,” while researchers assimilating sets of local case studies seek to “upscale.” In fact, place-based approaches to integrated understanding are fundamental to sustainability science (Kates et

182 APPENDIX D al., 2001; Turner et al., 2003). Yet the science base is relatively weak for understanding how human systems impacts of climate change vary across scales and how they reflect interactions among scales (e.g., Lebel and Wilbanks, 2003; NRC, 2006; Reid et al., 2006). Research needs that have been identified but not yet met include developing a bottom-up paradigm to meet the prevailing top-down paradigm for understanding climate impacts, developing a protocol for local case studies to increase the comparability of such studies, and improving the monitoring of local and small- region human systems data related to climate change impacts and responses (Wilbanks and Kates, 1999; Wilbanks, 2003). How the Fundamental Research Priorities Were Determined A wide range of possible research needs was identified by the ear- lier agenda-setting reports for global environmental change research and sustainability science already discussed. At the committee’s No- vember 2007 meeting, CHDGC members discussed the assigned question in the light of these past efforts and invited comments from distinguished committee alumni as well as other meeting participants. The resulting list of substantive research needs was reduced by the authors to the list above by informal consideration of the following issues: • Importance of the research area in terms of climate change drivers, impacts, and responses • Relevance of the fundamental research across multiple ap- plied research areas • Potential for connecting with and drawing on core disci- plinary strengths • Potential for payoff in decision support • Readiness of the scientific community to make progress in the area Time did not allow for more formal or systematic efforts to se- lect among possible priorities. Continued discussion with a broader cross section of researchers is likely to refine this list.

APPENDIX D 183 Potential Benefits from the Research Taken together, the above research priorities make up a program of activities that would advance fundamental understanding of the human systems factors that drive climate change and that shape the human capacity to respond. Research on priorities 1, 3, 4, and 6 would improve basic understanding of the human forces driving climate change, and research on these priorities and priorities 7 and 8 would improve the ability to model and forecast these human drivers. Taken together with research on the natural systems aspects of climate science, this research would improve the ability to project the human impacts of climate change. Research on priorities 2, 4, and 6 would help improve the ability of individuals and decision- making organizations to gain a more complete understanding of the implications of response options and thus to make better informed and more widely accepted choices. There are also potential benefits in terms of problem-specific knowledge and agencies’ mission responsibilities. Many of the above priorities can be pursued by individual mission agencies in their particular contexts (e.g., fundamental research on consumption can be carried out in the arenas of energy use, development of coastal lands, and air and water pollution). Such efforts can contrib- ute to the mission goals of the sponsoring agency and also to the development of basic knowledge that can be extended to benefit other agencies. This pattern of linking specific to general knowledge is illustrated by the development of knowledge about institutions and environmental resource use (priority 3). Research on this topic has been sponsored by agencies responsible for managing forests, fisheries, and international development, as well as by private foun- dations. Drawing on knowledge from varied research contexts, an international network of researchers has been building a body of fundamental knowledge that is providing useful insights and princi- ples applicable in new contexts (NRC, 2002c; Dietz et al., 2003).

184 APPENDIX D PRIORITIES FOR ACTION-ORIENTED HUMAN DIMENSIONS RESEARCH Human dimensions research inspired by the challenges of cli- mate change can be placed along a continuum from fundamental research to targeted, focused, or action-oriented research. At the fundamental end of the continuum lies research to understand the most basic phenomena underlying human interactions with the climate system: environmentally significant consumption, risk- related judgment and decision making, and the other topics identi- fied in the preceding section. Such research may not examine climate issues directly, but it illuminates processes that fundamentally shape human interactions with climate. As already noted, fundamental hu- man dimensions research is sometimes not recognized by government agencies as mission relevant. Near the targeted or focused end of the continuum lie research activities addressed to specific climate response issues, often of obvious relevance to mission agencies. Such research might in- form the design or implementation of policies or the pursuit of specific priorities of government agencies or private-sector organi- zations. For example, a government agency with a mission to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions might commission research to determine the most effective way to inform builders, mortgage lenders, and homeowners about the energy efficiency of buildings, with the goal of facilitating their decisions. The research might compare the effects of a certification system such as the Energy Star program for appliances with a rating system and with labels that provide numerical measures in energy or carbon units or with a monetary metric, such as energy cost of ownership. An emergency management agency might commission research to determine the readiness of first responders in a city to deal with a major coastal storm or a rush to hospital emergency rooms caused by a heat wave. Examples at this level of specificity could obvi- ously be listed almost ad infinitum. Priority setting for research at the most focused end of the con- tinuum makes sense only within the context of a specific mission. This section of the paper therefore focuses on a level of specificity between the ends of the continuum, where it makes sense to iden-

APPENDIX D 185 tify priorities at the level of the CCSP. This was done by consider- ing some of the main areas of CCSP responsibility, examining NRC reports and other key sources in these areas, and developing the following list of focused or action-oriented human dimensions research priorities. As there were no systematic deliberative proc- esses to consult that developed priorities at this level, the list is presented very tentatively as a basis for further discussion. 1. Understanding climate change vulnerabilities: Human development scenarios for potentially affected regions, popula- tions, and sectors. The impacts of climate change depend on the conjunction of physical and biological events, driven by climatic processes, with social and economic developments occurring on the same timescales in the affected places. Much attention has been given to improving projections of future biophysical events, but far less has been given to measuring and projecting the social, eco- nomic, and cultural conditions that determine the human consequences of those events: the ways economic development, human population dynamics, investments in physical infrastructure and emergency response capabilities, changes in the demand for water and other resources, land-use change, emissions of toxic substances, and other changes combine to alter the populations, places, and sectors that may experience climate-related shocks and thus affect their vulnerabilities. Research is needed to gather and organize data on these social forces and to build methods and models for estimating, analyzing, and projecting human vulner- abilities to climate change. The absence of past efforts to build linked time-series databases covering these variables is an im- pediment to progress, but there are useful data in many parts of the world that could be linked. The research could examine vulnerabil- ity on several dimensions: by type of climate-driven event (storm surge, crop failure, heat wave, changing ecology of disease, etc.), by location and scale, by socioeconomic characteristics of affected populations, and by sector (market and subsistence agriculture, water supply and quality, insured and uninsured property, public health, etc.). Estimates of the time trajectories of these vulnerabili- ties would yield scenarios of vulnerability that could be integrated

186 APPENDIX D with climate scenarios to produce improved projections of the im- pacts of climate change (NRC, 1998, 1999b, 2008). 2. Understanding mitigation potential: Driving forces, ca- pacities for change, and possible limits of change. Discussions of climate change mitigation are more often rooted in policy targets and integrated assessment modeling than in solid, evidence-based studies of the behavior of individuals, organizations, and econo- mies. We know that highly aggregated models of some of the drivers of climate change, such as energy and land use, have often been far off the mark in predicting future trends. Building such models from disaggregated data on population dynamics, eco- nomic activity, energy and resource demand, and other social indicators has the potential to yield improved forecasts based on better understanding of the underlying processes (NRC, 1984, 1992, 1997, 1998, 2005b). For example, carbon emissions per capita decreased by 10 percent in the United States between 1973 and 2001, but there was considerable variation between neighboring states: Per capita carbon emissions decreased in California by 31 percent in that period while they increased by 2 percent in Arizona; they decreased in Minnesota by 14 percent while they increased by 29 percent in Iowa (Blasing et al., 2004). Understanding such differ- ences can build deeper understanding of ongoing changes in carbon emissions and how they respond to various forces in the economic, social, and policy environments. Efforts to mitigate climate change by altering the driving forces depend on inducing social and behavioral change in indi- viduals, organizations, and institutions. Much of the needed change takes the form of inducing innovation and adoption of technologies for energy efficiency and low-carbon energy produc- tion and for the design of communities and other physical infrastructure; some involves changes in the use of existing technology and infrastructure. Change can potentially be accomplished by various combinations of regulatory action, standard setting, information, financial incentives, and voluntary action. However, research is needed to find the right combinations and to assess the efficacy of policy alternatives. The effects of particular interventions, such as providing financial incentives, are sometimes much less than ex- pected, and highly variable depending on the target actors and how

APPENDIX D 187 the policies are implemented (NRC, 1984, 1985, 1997, 2005a). Various NRC reports have elaborated on segments of the research agenda, for example, by reviewing knowledge on the potential of education, information, and voluntary measures (NRC, 2002b); the effects of tradable-permit and community-based management ap- proaches (NRC, 2002c); and mitigation-potential issues in sectors such as households (NRC, 1985, 2005a) and businesses (NRC, 2005a). 3. Understanding adaptation contexts, capacities for change, and possible limits of change. Adaptation to climate change is a mat- ter of how regions, sectors, populations, and their governing institutions cope with their vulnerabilities (Adger et al., 2007). It is a matter of anticipation, anticipatory actions to reduce vulnerability, immediate responses to climate-related events, and recovery, and in- cludes actions within various risk management systems (e.g., physical infrastructure, emergency response systems, insurance). Adaptive capacity varies with the type of event, the place, the time frame, and attributes of the affected human systems (e.g., Turner et al., 2003; Smit and Wandel, 2006). There are several research needs. One is to develop indicators of adaptive capacity that can address the di- versity of types of disruptive events; assess effects by region, sector, human activity, and timescale; incorporate assessments of coping capacity (e.g., emergency preparedness and response sys- tems, insurance systems, disaster relief capabilities); and consider diverse types of impacts (e.g., on life and health, economic systems, business organizations, governments, and communities; see Yohe and Tol, 2002; Brooks and Adger, 2005). Another need is to assess various generic and event-specific adaptation options in terms of their ability to reduce unwanted consequences of climate change. Like indicators, these assessments depend on timescale. For example, levees can protect against coastal storms expected on a timescale of decades, but on a timescale of centuries, urban redesign or reloca- tion may yield better results. Yet another is to assess barriers to adaptation, which can be significant even when capacity to adapt is high (Adger et al., 2007). These lines of research will lead to (a) more comprehensive models of the effects of climate change that take into account vulnerabilities, resilience, and coping responses; (b) improved means to prepare for effects and improve resilience;

188 APPENDIX D and (c) better informed public debate about the trade-offs involved in coping with the threats posed by climate change. 4. Understanding how mitigation and adaptation combine in determining human systems risks, vulnerabilities, and response challenges associated with climate change. Along with the impor- tance of improving the scientific understanding of mitigation and adaptation as separate research priorities, a rapidly emerging need is to improve the ability to consider mitigation and adaptation as joint contributors to an integrated approach to climate change re- sponses (Wilbanks et al., 2003; Klein et al., 2007). It is clear that both are needed, as mitigation seeks to keep climate change to a level at which adaptation can cope with most of the impacts, and as adaptation makes it possible to live with more realistically achievable mitigation targets. In developing its Fourth Assessment Report, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change made an effort to overcome organizational constraints to address such inte- gration issues in its Working Group II report, based partly on an “Expert Meeting on Integration of Adaptation, Mitigation, and Sustainable Development” in La Reunion, February 2005. But, with limited resources to understand the relationships of mitigation and adaptation, it is virtually impossible at present to analyze ques- tions of balance, possible complementarities and cobenefits, and relationships with sustainable development. The research chal- lenges include filling gaps in information needed for analysis and addressing the differences between mitigation and adaptation op- tions in their character (how, where, and when they work), their agency (who decides), and who benefits and who pays. Moreover, the two sets of research communities tend to be divided by a vast gulf of different methodologies and practices. The benefits include a more realistic and comprehensive understanding of climate re- sponse options, their relationships to each other, and their joint effects on the human consequences of climate change. 5. Understanding decision support needs for climate change responses and how to meet them. The success of efforts to develop a national climate service or the like will depend on its ability to provide credible, timely, and decision-relevant information to its constituencies. Research is needed to understand, for various classes of decision makers: the kinds of climate information that could help

APPENDIX D 189 them make better resource management and adaptation decisions, the ways such information can be made to fit into their decision routines, the factors that determine whether potentially useful in- formation is actually used, and the forms and sources of information that would make it most useful (NRC, 1999b, 2005a, 2008). This research should seek to improve the match between what science can provide and what decision makers need by identifying scientific information that would add value for users, finding better ways to deliver that information, and finding better ways to incorporate us- ers’ needs into research agenda-setting processes. This priority includes two related but distinct elements. One in- volves research to improve institutions for communication, such as networks that link the producers and users of information, usually through intermediary individuals or organizations (NRC, 2008). This research can help speed the evolution of effective networks by allow- ing them to build on basic social science knowledge and evaluations of past experience. The other element relates to the development of decision “tools,” messages, and other products that convey important information from its producers to intermediaries and from them to ultimate users. Research to develop networks and tools is clearly dis- tinct from their actual operation, which can be considered to be an outreach or extension activity (NRC, 2008). The conflation of re- search and operational decision support activities in CCSP documents makes it difficult to assess the research elements of the program (NRC, 2007a); in our view, investments in outreach should not be counted as research. Networks and tools are needed for both mitigation and adapta- tion. On the mitigation side, for example, businesses, governments, and households need tools to assess their emissions and evaluate ways to reduce them. Many available instruments, such as carbon calculators, are neither reliable nor transparent (Padgett et al., 2008). Research can help develop communication networks that deliver such information in ways that users find credible, salient, and understandable (NRC, 1984, 1989, 2002b). Adaptation also requires development of decision support tools and networks, though the tools have different purposes (e.g., estimating the prob- ability and severity of various kinds of climate-related extreme

190 APPENDIX D events), and the networks must link different sets of information providers and users. 6. Coordinating response efforts across scales. Both mitiga- tion and adaptation responses will depend on coordination among actors that function at different social and geographical scales. For mitigation, a key issue is the need for international coordination: National policies have little effect if they run counter to what is happening in other countries. There have been past successes, as with ozone-depleting substances, but climate mitigation is an espe- cially hard case because the emitters are so diffuse. Coordination must reach actors below the national level, either via national policy or in other ways (e.g., international voluntary agreements and standards; Prakash and Potoski, 2006). For adaptation, a key issue is that many of the affected localities, sectors, and populations lack the scientific resources needed to anticipate impacts and the financial resources needed to invest in anticipatory responses. These resources are likely to be available only from higher level actors, who must in turn develop ways to provide useful information to lower level actors, identify and prioritize needs, and coordinate responses (Wilbanks, 2007). Although there is a knowledge base from past experiences with cross-scale coordination, climate change provides new challenges, including the importance of global science for local adaptation. Pieces of the research agenda have been developed in several NRC studies (e.g., NRC, 2002b, c, 2008). Many of the fundamental research priorities outlined in the pre- ceding section are directly related to these more focused research needs by way of providing the scientific underpinning for them. Table D.1 shows how the two kinds of research are in fact closely related. For each of the six action-oriented research priorities, it identifies the fundamental research priorities that are relevant to the more focused need. Circles indicate the especially strong links. CRITICAL CONSTRAINTS ON PROGRESS The continuing underinvestment in human dimensions research (and especially in fundamental human dimensions research), since it was first noted in NRC reviews in 1990, suggests that a lack of well-

APPENDIX D 191 defined research priorities is not the main barrier to progress. This section discusses four additional fundamental barriers that have been identified in past NRC reports (NRC, 1990, 1992, 1999a, 2004, 2005a, 2007a), beginning with the ones that are most straightfor- ward to address and moving to the most challenging ones; and, as a basis for further discussion, it offers some ideas based on these re- ports. 1. Limitations in total level of support. The initial NRC review of the U.S. Global Change Research Program (NRC, 1990) concluded that the human interactions science priority, then at 3 percent of the budget, was “the most critically underfunded in the fiscal 1991 budget for the USGCRP.” A 1992 NRC report recommended that the level of support for human dimensions research be increased from 3 percent of the program (in FY 1991) to 5 percent, with a 3-year ramp-up pe- riod. This level was considered justified not only by need, but also by the capability of the research community to use the increased funds effectively. The report offered a set of concrete recommendations on how to allocate additional funds (approximately $20 million per year): an additional $7 million per year for new investigator-initiated basic and targeted research, $10 million for 100 new 2-year postdoctoral fellowships per year, and an increment of $2 million to $4 million for data acquisition and dissemination. The report noted that the data is- sue in particular could benefit from even larger increases in funding. In 2004, the NRC review of the CCSP strategic plan noted the need to accelerate efforts in “underemphasized program elements,” including “human dimensions, economics, impacts, mitigation, and adaptation” (NRC, 2004:2). By FY 2006, however, human dimensions funding had declined from the FY 1991 level to the point that the relevant program element, which included both human dimensions research and an undetermined amount of nonresearch expenditures on decision support systems, constituted 2 percent of the program (NRC, 2007a). The most recent NRC review (NRC, 2007a:4) concluded that “Pro- gress in human dimensions research has lagged progress in natural climate science . . . . This disparity in progress likely reflects the in- ability of the CCSP to support a consistent and cogent research agenda as recommended in previous studies.”

TABLE D.1 Relationship Between Fundamental Research Priorities and Focused Research Needs 192 APPENDIX D

APPENDIX D 193 Given increasing demand in recent years for human dimen- sions knowledge to inform responses to climate change, we believe that a level of support beyond 5 percent of the total program could be justified today. Determining how much of an increase can be effectively absorbed by the research community, and how fast, will require more careful analysis of capabilities than is possible with available information. Because of the longstanding underfunding of human dimen- sions research, we do not think that expanded development of the above priority areas can be achieved by reallocating funds from other areas of human dimensions research that are already well developed. If funding for climate change research continues to be flat, we think these priorities can only be developed by reallocating funds from well-developed areas of natural systems research. The needed reallocation may be small, however, because human sys- tems research is typically far less expensive than natural systems research. 2. Data needs and limitations. As mentioned previously, the shortage of human systems data in forms useful for analysis of human dimensions issues has been discussed in a number of NRC reports (e.g., NRC, 1992, 1999a, 2005a). There is a particular need for time-series data regarding human pressures on the global envi- ronment, such as data on land cover and land use, extraction of natural resources from ecosystems, energy consumption and pol- lutant emissions from various sources and sectors, human attitudes, valuations, and responses. There is a similar need for data on hu- man consequences of and responses to global environmental change, such as morbidity and mortality data related to air and wa- ter quality and vulnerabilities to climate-related extreme events. A major constraint on progress in modeling and understanding hu- man–climate interactions is the lack of reliable, linked databases tracking human activities and the natural systems they change and that in turn affect them. The NRC recommended in 1992 that the first steps include efforts to identify major data needs, inventory available datasets from public and private sources, and assess what would be needed to (a) link existing human and environmental datasets and (b) fill critical gaps in existing data bases. At that time, it recommended that an extra $2 million to $4 million per

194 APPENDIX D year be devoted to data acquisition and dissemination. Subsequent NRC reports (NRC, 1999c, 2005a) have expanded on these rec- ommendations to identify types of indicators that should be developed to improve understanding of human interactions with the global environment. The most recent NRC review of the CCSP (NRC, 2007a:79) noted an institutional difficulty related to the data needs: “[T]he need to collect social, economic, and health data to address the human dimensions aspects of the program adds an additional level of complexity because these data are outside the purview of agencies traditionally associated with climate meas- urements.” We do not think it is an exaggeration to say that in most of the CCSP agencies, the concept of observations does not include observations of human activities or human conditions. A comprehensive approach to addressing the data constraint would be a major effort to develop linked data on social and environ- mental phenomena in time series, across space, and at multiple analytical levels. A human dimensions observational system would complement the natural science observational systems that are so central to the CCSP. Such an effort, in addition to its value for re- search, could provide new opportunities for social science research that would attract early-career and established researchers from the disciplines into global change research and thus expand the pool of strong researchers in the area. This approach also could help en- courage agencies to support fundamental human dimensions research by demonstrating the mission relevance of research using social science concepts and variables. 3. Connections with the basic social and behavioral sciences. As already noted, fundamental human dimensions research pursues questions driven by concerns with problems of climate change rather than issues arising from the social science disciplines. There are connections between the two, but they are not always obvious to researchers in the disciplines. Moreover, the relevance of discipli- nary concepts to climate problems does not always seem the same from a disciplinary standpoint as from a climate problem perspec- tive. For example, household energy consumption is an important contributor to global greenhouse gas emissions, but understanding it requires concepts from multiple disciplines. Efforts to explain it only in terms of environmental attitudes (psychology), social position

APPENDIX D 195 (sociology), or household income (economics) are likely to seem naïve or seriously incomplete to scientists who take a broader view of the climate problem. The problem of linking the disciplines to climate questions is in part one of developing theory and method. Issues such as environmental consumption, land-use change, and valuation of environmental resources, among others, do not yield easily to discipline-specific concepts, theories, or methods. Argua- bly, multidisciplinary approaches are more likely to yield useful tools for answering questions about human–climate interactions. The roles of disciplinary tools must be worked out over time in re- search teams and the wider community. Without sufficient support for such teams to work together over time, progress will be restrained. The problem is also one of human resource development. Sci- entists with a strong social science disciplinary background have a learning curve to traverse before they can make serious contribu- tions to understanding the climate problem. In our view, so far the CCSP as a program has not made efforts to speed this learning, for example, by supporting interdisciplinary graduate training pro- grams in climate science that encourage social scientists to apply. More could be done to draw social scientists to climate change research, particularly at the predoctoral and early career stages, as noted in past NRC reviews. The 1992 NRC review devoted a chap- ter to human resource and organization issues and offered several recommendations for addressing the problem, including the crea- tion of a transportable 5-year package of dissertation, postdoctoral, and research support. This idea was echoed in a proposal voiced at the CHDGC’s 2007 workshop on linking environmental research and the social and behavioral sciences. The idea would be to facili- tate career advancement for social scientists working in a field outside the core of their disciplines, which could help build the community of researchers and might strengthen interdisciplinary institutions working on climate change. As the most recent NRC (2007a:92) review noted, “The natural sciences may offer a suc- cessful model for building human dimensions capacity, especially programs to move young investigators into the arena and to sup- port postdocs.” 4. Organizational barriers in the federal government. The 1992 NRC review concluded that there was “an almost complete

196 APPENDIX D mismatch between the roster of agencies that support research on global change and the roster of agencies with strong capabilities in social science” (NRC, 1992:10). As already noted, NSF is essen- tially the only CCSP agency in which fundamental research in the human systems sciences is considered part of the agency’s mission. Climate change, however, is not central to the NSF mission. CCSP agencies with climate missions seem ready to recognize fundamen- tal natural systems research related to climate change as falling within their missions, but much less ready to accord the same recog- nition to human systems research. Some of these agencies support human dimensions research in particular applied areas, some of it quite valuable to the CCSP, but in our view these efforts have done little to build the kinds of fundamental knowledge prioritized earlier in this paper. The CCSP and its agencies could show leadership in addressing this challenge by supporting fundamental research on the human-system components of climate change. The 1992 study proposed that federal agencies that support ba- sic natural science research on global change, but only applied social science, expand their support to include fundamental social science research related to specific global change topics of interest to them. This is one approach to overcoming organizational barri- ers in the agencies. Subsequent NRC reports have noted the lack of a programwide office with significant budgetary authority. Organ- izational barriers might be addressed in part by endowing the program office with sufficient authority and staffing to develop the human interactions program element centrally. These constraints have all been present for a long time, and the research community has been aware of them for a long time. All of them were identified in the first NRC (1992) review of human di- mensions in the U.S. Global Research Program. Not since that review has any NRC group attempted to define in any detail im- plementation strategies for overcoming them. The 1992 review, particularly Chapter 6 on data needs, Chapter 7 on human re- sources and organizational structures, and Chapter 8 on the structure of a national research program, still offers the most com- prehensive analysis available for developing recommendations for implementing an effective human dimensions element in the CCSP. However, it requires updating to take into account progress

APPENDIX D 197 since then in supplying human dimensions knowledge and a major increase in demand for it, occasioned by greatly increased accep- tance of the need for science to understand the human consequences of climate change and to inform decisions on how to respond to the associated risks and opportunities. Responding to these constraints also requires attention to the history of the program’s responses since 1990 to NRC recom- mendations to expand human dimensions research. This history suggests to us that some of the organizational barriers in the CCSP and its participating agencies are strongly entrenched. We there- fore suggest that the Strategic Advice Committee give serious attention to ways to overcome organizational barriers, so that its priorities for human systems research will stand a better chance of implementation than the recommendations of past NRC study committees. We suggest that the committee consider such recom- mendations as (a) reconsidering the purposes of the program at a time when the national concern has broadened from documenting and attributing climate change to informing responses to it, (b) un- dertaking new commitments at the program level, (c) making organizational changes in the climate programs of CCSP mission agencies, and (d) hiring staff in the program office and some of the agencies with the expertise and authority required to organize the needed research. SUMMARY Reviews of the CCSP and the previous Global Change Re- search Program have repeatedly found significant underinvestment in research on the human systems and their interactions with cli- mate. Drawing on these reviews and recent discussions at meetings of the NRC Committee on the Human Dimensions of Global Change, this paper identifies five substantive research priorities for developing the human systems side of climate science: research on environmentally significant consumption, judgment and decision making under uncertainty, institutions and climate change, tech- nological change, and valuation of climate change and human responses. Three crosscutting science priorities are also critical:

198 APPENDIX D developing human systems observations, indicators, and metrics and linking them to natural systems data; understanding nonlin- earities and complexities in system response; and understanding scale dependencies and interactions. The paper also identifies six priorities for research that is more action-oriented in the near term than the fundamental research that is suggested. For any of these priorities to be implemented, four critical constraints on scientific progress require attention: limited levels of support, data gaps, lim- ited capability for multidisciplinary environmental research among researchers with social and behavioral science expertise, and per- haps most critical, organizational barriers to human dimensions research in federal agencies responsible for climate change sci- ence. The paper briefly discusses implementation issues related to overcoming these constraints. REFERENCES Adger, W.N., S. Agrawala, M.M.Q. Mirza, C. Conde, K. O’Brien, J. Pulhin, R. Pulwarty, B. Smit, and K. Takahashi, 2007, As- sessment of adaptation practices, options, constraints and capacity, in Climate Change 2007: Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability. Contribution of Working Group II to the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, M.L. Parry, O.F. Canziani, J.P. Palutikof, P.J. van der Linden, and C.E. Hanson, eds., Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 717–743. Blasing, T.J., C.T. Broniak, and G. Marland, 2004, Estimates of annual fossil-fuel CO2 emitted for each state in the U.S.A. and the District of Columbia for each year from 1960 through 2001, in Trends: A Compendium of Data on Global Change, Carbon Dioxide Information Analysis Center, Oak Ridge Na- tional Laboratory, available at http://cdiac.esd.ornl.gov/ trends/emis_mon/stateemis/emis_state.htm. Brooks, N., and W.N. Adger, 2005, Assessing and enhancing adap- tive capacity, in Adaptation Policy Frameworks for Climate Change, B. Lim, E. Spanger-Siegfried, I. Burton, E.L. Malone, and S. Huq, eds., Cambridge University Press, New York, pp. 165–182.

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Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change Get This Book
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Climate change is one of the most important global environmental problems facing the world today. Policy decisions are already being made to limit or adapt to climate change and its impacts, but there is a need for greater integration between science and decision making. This book proposes six priorities for restructuring the United States' climate change research program to develop a more robust knowledge base and support informed responses:

  • Reorganize the Program Around Integrated Scientific-Societal Issues
  • Establish a U.S. Climate Observing System
  • Support a New Generation of Coupled Earth System Models
  • Strengthen Research on Adaptation, Mitigation, and Vulnerability
  • Initiate a National Assessment of the Risks and Costs of Climate Change Impacts and Options to Respond
  • Coordinate Federal Efforts to Provide Climate Information, Tools, and Forecasts Routinely to Decision Makers
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