Climate adaptation and preparedness: small-scale wickedness as a third order effect influencing governance capacity in municipalities and state agencies in western Norway

Abstract

Climate change poses a series of risks and hazards that fall within the responsibilities of public sector organizations. Climate adaptation and preparedness for climate-related events creates pressures for these organizations to handle complex, fragmented, divergent and uncertain problems that are more locally oriented than what is typically considered as the main wickedness of climate change-related action. In this article, two questions are raised: whether there may be a particular form of small-scale wickedness associated with climate adaptation and preparedness, and what the issues this would raise for governance capacity. By investigating six cases where Norwegian local, regional and national public organizations interact, the article suggests that there is indeed a certain small-scale wickedness in the context of local climate adaptation and preparedness. This wickedness intertwines with organizational factors relating to coordination and interconnectivity across levels and actors. This may contribute to an ‘amplification’ of the wicked characteristics of local climate adaptation and preparedness issues. Although important elements of this wickedness rests with climate change as such, the presence of third order effects are displayed in increasing complexity, fragmentation, uncertainty and divergence. These wicked aspects are arguably barriers to establishing, sustaining and increasing governance capacity.