Adapting to hurricanes. A historical perspective on New Orleans from its foundation to Hurricane Katrina, 1718–2005

Abstract

Recent policy debates on climate change have started highlighting the importance of adaptation of societies to new conditions projected by climate scientists. Previously, mitigation had been almost the sole focus of policy-makers for fear of creating a moral hazard when concentrating more strongly on adaptation. Yet, with many of the climatic changes the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) projected occurring faster than scientists predicted, adaptation has reentered the debate as an imperative. In this context, in which adaptation-a process often unfolding on deep timescales-becomes prescriptive, it is crucial to look at the historical development of adaptive practices over the long term in order to appreciate the complexity of their evolution. This paper is a hybrid between a summary of a research project and a review of the most crucial literature on which it was based. The point of departure of this study was Hurricane Katrina, which, after it had flooded New Orleans on August 29, 2005, raised the question, how such a disaster could have happened in one of the most technologically advanced nations in the world. I then rewind to the foundation of the city in 1718 and work my way along case studies through three centuries of hurricane history in New Orleans. The red thread is the concept of adaptation. I review the definition of adaptation provided by the Fifth Assessment Report of the IPCC from a historian's point of view and suggest a slight change of perspective. Knowledge as a precondition for adaptation, contingency, path-dependence, political vulnerability, and the interplay of cultural, legal, and political factors emerge as crucial characteristics in the historical evolution of adaptive practices throughout the almost 300-year period of study.

Economic inequality and institutional adaptation in response to flood hazards: a historical analysis

“…The second main conclusion of our historical and comparative analysis concerns the inevitability of institutional adaptation. Our analysis shows that even after decreased resilience, in cases where institutions did not adapt to changing circumstances, and where this led to a growing incidence of disastrous floods, it was not at all inevitable that institutions adapted in response to these pressures (for a comparative study, see Rohland 2018). For example, increased flooding in 16th-century Guelders and 17thcentury Groningen failed to provoke any kind of necessary institutional changes.…”

“…This allows us to discuss temporal dimensions, including those in the very long run. The relationships between inequality, institutions, and adaptation discussed here developed over time, did not necessarily move in one direction, and societal responses were often lengthy, necessitating the use of the historical record (van Bavel and Curtis 2016, Rohland 2018). The historical record also offers a wide variety in levels of inequality, institutional arrangements, social characteristics, and flooding outcomes, which were often importantly found at a regional level, sometimes even regions close together subject to the same kinds of exogenous shock (Curtis et al 2016).…”

Expanding use of archaeology in climate change response by changing its social environment

“…While no past society is a direct model of present societies, past societies provided similar arrays of services to their members, such as economic and trade relationships, food and shelter, belief systems, governance structures, social norms, and cultural traditions. At the same time, there is evidence that the forms of past societies also have influenced, to varying degrees, institutions and settlement patterns that exist today (17)(18)(19)(20).…”

Rediscovering lessons of adaptation from the past

“…Within archaeology and history, an increasing number of publications consider the use of historical data for scenario-based planning and risk reduction (Riede, 2014b(Riede, , 2017a(Riede, , 2017bKennett and Marwan, 2015;Rohland, 2017;Adamson et al, 2018). Many suggest that coupled climate models are required to understand human-environment interaction (Riede, 2014a;Palmer and Smith, 2014), but few focus on direct channels of engagement in existing GCR frameworks (Beckage et al, 2018).…”