Expert-influence in adapting flood governance: An institutional analysis of the spatial turns in the United States and the Netherlands

Abstract

In response to climate change, many national governments are shifting their focus from ‘safety’ to ‘spatial-planning’ measures in flood governance. Rather than providing full protection against floods, spatial-planning measures aim to reduce the impacts of floods by encouraging damage mitigation in local-level spatial-planning and building choices. This turn to spatial-planning measures has important implications for how costs and responsibilities are divided in flood governance. This paper examines the role of experts in shaping the distributive aspects of this shift. Using a theoretical framework on institutional change, the role of experts is analyzed in two case studies. The first focuses on the United States, where a turn to spatial-planning measures was made in the 1960s. The second case study looks at this turn Dutch flood governance, which has always been characterized by a strong safety paradigm. The paper draws conclusions about the effects of expert-influence on distributive decision-making underlying institutional changes in both cases.

Explaining and Measuring Social-Ecological Pathways: The Case of Global Changes and Water Security

“…Learning could be tested as well. Since the 1960s, changes in experts influence significantly impacted Dutch and American flood governance in order to limit exposure to floods during [92]. Linking these changes with accurate measures about floods, through EODC, allows for a systematic analysis of the reorganization of SESs.…”

Introduction to the special issue on adapting institutions to climate change

“…Research gaps emerge instead concerning operational and constitutional choice, private adaptation, physical interactions and biophysical conditions. Bergsma (2017) examines the role of experts in the introduction of spatial planning considerations for dealing with floods. Central to her analysis is the paradigm shift taking place in the realm of river basin management, moving away from an understanding of total safety from floods, and toward the acknowledgement that floods do happen even against the best infrastructure.…”

“…Property rights are a crucial element in the workings of institutions, which indeed can be understood as distributions of entitlements and obligations among actors. Climate impacts have no understanding of property rights, though, and both Gawel et al (2016) and Bergsma (2017) have shown the distributive implications of adapting to climate change. In a world where the (re)distributive implications of adaptation are the norm and not the exception, what happens to property rights?…”

Explaining and Measuring Social-Ecological Pathways: The Case of Global Changes and Water Security

“…Learning could be tested as well. Since the 1960ies, changes in experts influence significantly impacted Dutch and American flood governance in order to limit exposure to floods during (Bergsma, 2018). Linking these changes with accurate measures about floods, through EODC, allows for a systematic analysis of the reorganization of SESs.…”