Allocating climate adaptation finance: examining three ethical arguments for recipient control

Abstract

Most agree that large sums of money should be transferred to the most vulnerable countries in order to help them adapt to climate change. But how should that money be allocated within those countries? A popular and intuitively plausible answer, in line with the strong standing of the norm of ownership in development aid circles, is that this is for the recipient country to decide. The paper investigates the three most important types of ethical arguments for such 'recipient control': the epistemic argument, the entitlement argument, and the legitimacy argument. It is argued that there is a good case for recipient control in democratic countries, because such countries can be expected to act in the name of the people to whom adaptation finance is ultimately owed. However, the three arguments do not support, even if taken jointly, recipient control in nondemocratic countries. This is a significant result seeing as the majority of the most vulnerable countries are nondemocratic.

Allocation of aid for adaptation to climate change: Do vulnerable countries receive more support?

“…Additionally, we only consider allocation among different developing countries, but not distribution within recipient countries; we therefore cannot be sure that adaptation aid reaches those most vulnerable communities and individuals within a country (cf. Barrett 2014;Duus-Otterstršm 2015). Finally, vulnerability is per se a contested concept that is difficult to measure at the national as well as at the sub-national level.…”

Access and allocation in climate change adaptation

“…From a justice perspective, it is important that these questions be addressed, as only predictable and accessible finance that does not come at the expense of other development projects can meaningfully help recipients deal with growing climate impacts. However, who these recipients should be is also controversial, despite the political and academic consensus of prioritising the most vulnerable (Grasso 2010a, b;Ciplet et al 2013;Duus-Otterström 2015). Yet, as discussed in Sect.…”

Do direct-access and indirect-access adaptation projects differ in their focus on local communities? A systematic analysis of 63 Adaptation Fund projects

“…The latter position has gained some momentum with the adoption of direct access by the Green Climate Fund (GCF) (GCF 2015). However, indirect access had been the norm in international adaptation finance and remains the most dominant access modality today (Duus-Otterström 2016).…”

“…Much of the current literature on direct access discusses its key features and the implications on the recipient country-fund relationships (Bird 2014;Brown et al 2010;Druce et al 2013;Harmeling and Kaloga 2010). Some scholars examine supportive and opposing arguments for the modality (Craeynest et al 2010;Duus-Otterström 2016). Recent studies began to assess the operationalization experience of the modality (Druce et al 2013;Masullo et al 2015;Schäfer et al 2014;UNDP 2012), focusing on lessons learned from accredited national institutions and making recommendations to improve the AF accreditation procedures to accelerate direct access.…”