CAPÍTULO 2. COMUNICACIÓN
2.2 COMUNICACIÓN PUBLICITARIA
Idealises ‘Communities’
One of the most prominent weaknesses of CBA, which extends to the general practice of community-based development practice, is that it risks idealising the community and being blind to its heterogeneous nature (Schipper, 2008). During the Third International Workshop on CBA, Terry Cannon from IIED criticised the use of
‘community’ in CBA as it connotes an “idyllic scenario that often does not really exist” (Leopold & Mead, 2009, p. 4). There are four potential ways in which communities are idealised. Firstly, ‘community’ based practice often assumes democracy – or in other words the community is perceived to be a homogeneous entity that can make decisions in a democratic way. This however is untrue. A closer look at the literature on participation and engagement reveals that communities are excluded not only from without but also from within. (Dodman & Mitlin, 2010) Issues of gender, age, socio-economic position, and religion among others determine power relations and hierarchies and can divide people within communities. Therefore it is necessary for CBA practitioners to gain a detailed understanding of power relations before engaging communities in participatory work. To assume that all
people within a community will be able to participate and benefit from CBA is misleading. Secondly, community members are often perceived as being equally exposed and vulnerable to climate change risks. In reality issues of gender and age, in particular, not only exclude people within communities from decision-making but also may increase certain groups’ exposure and vulnerability to climate change impacts. (Ibid.) Thirdly, and along a similar line, communities are often aggregated into the same grouping of poverty. Thus CBA fails to take “a sophisticated view of disaggregating communities into different groupings of poverty and vulnerability”
(Sabates-Wheeler et al., 2008, p. 54). In other words, the poor may be categorised as chronically or transiently poor and accordingly have varying levels of vulnerability and need different adaptive strategies. Unfortunately, in the majority of cases, CBA approaches assume that one adaptation strategy is applicable and “equally effective”
for both chronically and transiently poor communities and “have not helped communities tailor adaptation measures to these different groupings” (Ibid., p. 54).
Fourthly, the adaptive actions that communities can achieve are often seen through rose coloured spectacles and in isolation. In fact communities have a limited amount of available resources and a limited scope of what they can address regardless of how organized or representative they are. A lot of the climate protection that communities need is found in large-scale infrastructure that is part of city-wide systems therefore the scope of proactive community action is limited unless partnered with government agencies. (Moser & Satterthwaite, 2008) Therefore there is a persistent gap in CBA work “between what needs to be done and what can be achieved at the community level” (Leopold & Mead, 2009, p. 4).
Local Nature
The ‘local nature’ of CBA is one of four major conceptual shortcomings that Dodman and Mitlin (2010) identify in their paper ‘Challenges for Community Based Adaptation: discovering the potential for transformation’. In sum, they critique that
CBA frames climate change adaptation as a local issue. They argue that whilst it is correct that the local context determines how climate change impacts are experienced, and that adaptation is most appropriate at the local and municipal levels as some purport (for example, Tanner and others, 200937), this does not negate the need for extra local support and resources or efforts to remove underlying hazards, especially national and international finance to subsidise local improvements and policies to support service provision (Dodman & Mitlin, 2010). As Shaw states “...focusing on communities is not enough, and as long as the community initiatives do not become part of the government policies, it is difficult to sustain the efforts... Thus, the link between local, state, and national governments with the community is of utmost importance” (Shaw, 2006, p. 522). Such national policies are fundamental for
“facilitat[ing] local knowledge generation, strengthen[ing] the roles and responsibilities of local government institutions, creat[ing] access to and control over resources for poor people and enabl[ing] them to utilise opportunities for a dignified life” (Raihan et al., 2010, p. 63). However, although “[i]n reality very little happens locally without national policies”, such comprehensive national adaptation policies are lacking at present and need to be strengthened (Ibid.).
The current local nature of CBA also risks dismissing the need for adaptation to be implemented at a variety of scales when in fact, as many argue, it is essential for adaptation strategies to be implemented at a range of scales from the global and formal to the local and spontaneous, as well as in the form of cross-scale interactions (Adger, 2001; Adger, Arnell, & Tompkins, 2005; Dodman & Mitlin, 2010).
Adaptation across multiple scales are necessary because responses to local climate risks may have limited effectiveness in the longer term and may possibly be undermined by future climate change impacts that “cannot be addressed by isolated and piecemeal interventions” alone as they increasingly cross geographic and
37 See Tanner T, Mitchell T, Polack E, Guenther B (2009) ‘Urban governance for adaptation: assessing climate change resilience in ten Asian cities’. Institute for Development Studies Working Paper 315, IDS: Sussex.
political borders (Ayers et al., 2009; Dodman & Mitlin, 2010). A heavy local focus also not only underplays local inequalities and power relations as mentioned above, but also it underplays national and transnational and political forces and their impact upon adaptation responses (Dodman & Mitlin, 2010). Finally, Dodman and Mitlin (2010) highlight that participatory processes should not be exclusive to the local level; instead they should be part of decision making at every level. Although higher-level institutions often may represent local opinions, issues may be incompatible due to differing perceptions of risks and opinions on potential responses.
Partial Nature
The ‘partial nature’ of CBA refers to CBA’s tendency to focus on climate change at the exclusion of other dimensions of vulnerability. This is the second major conceptual shortcoming identified by Dodman and Mitlin as they claim that “[i]t is foolish to imagine that a commitment to climate change adaptation is sufficient to change the pattern of development and secure new, pro-poor options. Equally, in practice, low- income communities consider climate change to be one among many adverse factors that they have to contend with in their struggle for survival” (2010, p.
10). For example, in addition to climate risks poor residents struggle with insecure tenure, inadequate basic service provision, lack of income and food, and insufficient livelihood opportunities. Therefore although many CBA practitioners acknowledge that their response fits within the broader goals of development, prevalent structures of funding prohibit CBA from addressing non-climate change issues. (Dodman &
Mitlin, 2010)
Weak Definitions and Methodology
A criticism or weakness of CBA, which traces back to the First International Workshop on CBA, is the lack of clarity surrounding its definition (Dodman &
Mitlin, 2010). This in large stems from the way CBA has been attached to numerous types of intervention, which results in shared language, however these may carry
different conceptual meanings. For example, there is fear that if CBA becomes too focused on the micro- level it will risk duplicating efforts in Disaster Risk Reduction programmes and social protection arenas (Sabates-Wheeler et al., 2008). This highlights a need to firm up CBA definitions and for more efforts to link and unify adaptation, development and disaster discourses. Secondly, there is a need to adequately conceptualise risk and uncertainty (which are found at multiple levels) and apply their implications for CBA activities;; CBA’s current focus on climate risk at the community-scale fails to do this (Dodman & Mitlin, 2010). Finally there is a need for clarity around the term ‘adaptation’. Although adaptation is accepted as a necessary fundamental response to future climate change impacts, it is important to recognise the breadth and depth of unknowns (Ibid.). In reality there are large uncertainties about how adaptation strategies will reduce climate risks and also realisation that short-term adaptation in the community can potentially cause maladaptation in the longer-term (Brooks, Grist, & Brown, 2009; Dodman & Mitlin, 2010). As such CBA practitioners need to build trust and to use careful, honest communication about climate change and adaptation.
A review of CBA literature also reveals what might be called a weakness in CBA methodology: there is no set CBA process per se nor prescriptive methodology (as Tables 9 and 10 in Section 3.3 illustrate). This can be frustrating for practitioners who seek guidance on how to implement CBA. On the other hand however this accounts for the fact that CBA can manifest in various forms (see Sub-section 4.3.1) and therefore fall under an umbrella of methods. Rather than a weakness this arguably is a strength, which allows a range of methods to be considered CBA.
Lacks Integration into Development Plans
Finally, according to Sabates-Wheeler and others (2008) CBA and local adaptation responses are not adequately incorporated into city development plans. They explain that up until now, CBA has largely been separate from experience in other project
areas because the adaptation community has typically worked independently from the development community. As a result many local level initiatives have limited scope and impact because they need dynamism from the wider society and economy to sustain them (Ibid.).
3.6.2 Challenges
Based on the critique and limitations above, if CBA is to continue to strengthen and grow in maturity as a respected approach to climate change impacts among the urban poor there are numerous challenges that it needs to address. Seven such challenges arise from the above discussion and are identified below.
Incorporation of Large-Scale Impacts of Climate Change and Long-term Adaptation Strategies into CBA
CBA currently focuses on local adaptation to more immediate climate risks and many CBA projects do not draw directly from IPCC projections for large-scale impacts of climate change, namely global and regional changes in temperature and precipitation, sea level rise and changes to the occurrence and intensity of climate-related hazards38. In many ways it is CBA’s strength that it addresses the underlying drivers of vulnerability rather than taking an “impacts-based” approach. Nonetheless it faces challenges on how to incorporate large-scale climate change impacts into the scenarios it tells communities, and furthermore how to lead effective adaptations to future climate change meanwhile maintaining a community-driven approach (Ayers et al., 2009; Huq & Ayers, 2009). These challenges necessitate that CBA engages with long-term adaptation strategies, recognises that ‘good’ adaptation requires consideration of immediate and long term vulnerability and climate change contexts, and draws links to more strategic and wider climate change policies and measures (Ayers et al., 2009). Specifically, CBA needs to pay more attention to
38 Many CBA projects do not draw upon IPCC climate change projections because their relevance and accuracy for the local level is questionable. Hence there is a need to improve the availability and relevance of downscaled modelled data on climate change impacts, nonetheless caution is still needed even when using these for CBA work (Ayers and Forsyth, 2009).
induced climate change in poor communities and not just climate variability (Kantai et al., 2010).
Partnerships with Institutional Levels
Schipper (2008) highlights that vulnerability to climate change cannot be tackled by community-level action alone, but requires support by the policy and market context.
She states that “people are not passive victims who lack the drive to improve their lives”, but despite their creativity, unless their adaptation responses are aligned with the local development context, they will rarely be effective (Ibid., p. 2). It was mentioned above under the critique and limitations of CBA (see Sub-section 3.6.1) that national level policies and institutions have an important role to play in adaptation; indeed institutional and political marginalisation can inhibit building adaptive communities (Ensor & Berger, 2009). This is because local level responses to climate change impacts may not in fact be able to influence the root causes of vulnerability that can often be traced back through the myriad of processes and linkages that connect people at the grassroots with the national and international political economy (Schipper, 2008; van Aalst et al., 2008, p. 170). Consequently,
“partnership works best when low-income groups have representative organizations and where municipal agencies are responsive and accountable to local actors.
Achieving this is one of the biggest challenges facing not just adaptation, but also progressive, pro-poor urban development more generally” (Moser & Satterthwaite, 2008, p. 19). Although local governments play a central facilitating role in local adaptation, many are currently unprepared to cope with climate change adaptation (Raihan et al., 2010).
Sustainability of CBA
Much of the surrounding literature concurs that one of CBA’s major challenges is the sustainability of adaptation efforts at the community level. Reid and others claim that for CBA programmes to be successful they need to “ensure that communities are able
to participate in identifying priorities, both local and regional, and in planning, implementing, monitoring & reviewing adaptation” (2009, pp. 27-28). In other words, to be effective and to create sustainable impact, CBA needs to empower community members and support their capacity to change their own situation as well as extend its application “beyond the initiatives of the communities, NGOs, and a handful of local governments” (Shaw, 2006, p. 538; van Aalst et al., 2008). Nevertheless in this process CBA needs to be careful to circumvent the dangers of other development interventions, and maintain its focus on local knowledge and capacity for action (Dodman & Mitlin, 2010).
Scaling-Up CBA and Evaluation
The main topic of the Fifth International Conference on CBA focused on the challenge of scaling-up. Now that there is a substantial number of CBA programmes worldwide the challenge is to find better ways of communicating lessons from current CBA practice and to transform CBA from piecemeal case studies into “more iterative forms and processes that can be operationalised” (Huq & Ayers, 2010; Leopold &
Mead, 2009, p. 12). Ayers and Forsyth (2009) suggest that in order to make CBA lessons relevant for the wider spatial scales the ‘Sustainable Livelihoods Approach’
may be sensitized to future climate risks. However Terry Cannon cautions that participatory approaches may become obsolete leading to the use of merit and profit-based approaches if CBA interventions are scaled-up (Leopold & Mead, 2009). In relation to creating a legitimate evaluation framework, CBA not only faces the prominent challenge of how to evaluate adaptation, but also it faces the challenge of responding “to donors’ demands [for evaluation] whilst being accessible to communities so that they can access resources for CBA quickly and efficiently” (Huq
& Ayers, 2010, p. 22).
Incorporation of Community-Based Issues into Policy
Schipper among others advocates that national planners must be aware of the local dynamics and also must communicate with local actors and groups in order to align the enabling environment with the capacity that already exists in communities (Schipper, 2008). Nonetheless translating CBA initiatives for national and international policy relevance remains a challenge. Unfortunately the implementation of CBA is affected by the deep-seated challenges and uncertainties about the interpretation of adaptation policy in general – for example, what is adaptation to climate change versus normative climatic variability, and who or what adapts and how? (Ayers & Forsyth, 2009)
Awareness of Internal Dynamics and External Enabling Conditions
It was discussed under the critique and limitations of CBA that is it possible for advocates of CBA to idealise the community. The challenge therefore to CBA is to recognise the heterogeneity of communities and thus to learn about and be aware of their internal dynamics. This is turn requires looking at the adaptive capacity of individuals and households in contrast to the collective community, and creating adaptation actions that will vary from household to household and community to community (Schipper, 2008). CBA practitioners must also understand how diversity and power relations within a community can bring complexity for building adaptive capacity under CBA strategies.
Secondly, CBA needs to recognise that to function well it must take into account the role of external enabling conditions and to remember that it is just one of many actors necessary for adaptive capacity building. Because enabling conditions are likely to be unique to every community CBA must be conscious that one adaptation measure, which worked for one community, may not be effective and may even constrain climate change adaptation in another community (Ibid.).
Conceptual Development
Finally, CBA faces the challenge of its conceptual development. In other words, due to the common characteristics between CBA and disaster and development discourses, there is a great need to refine and further articulate the concept of CBA;
specifically to respond to questions such as ‘How does CBA differ from community-based development initiatives?’ and to demonstrate that CBA is valuable, different and yet complementary to community-based development (Ayers & Forsyth, 2009;
Huq & Ayers, 2010). This may be achieved in part by developing a common understanding of language, and in sharing experiences and good practice between the disciplines (Reid et al., 2009).
3.7 Summary
This chapter has shown that there is an escalating interest, conceptual development and practice of CBA around the world. Specifically this is facilitated through the International Conferences on CBA established in 2005 and run every year since 2009, and outcomes from these such as the CBA-Exchange and the Global Initiative on CBA. It also shows that the CBA methodology follows four key stages however these are often interpreted and thus implemented in a variety of forms by development agencies. This chapter has sought to categorise the general current practice of CBA and thus illustrates that although development responses to climate change through adaptation strategies among the urban poor are acknowledged by the academic community to be of great importance, in urban areas there are few or no explicit CBA programmes at the community level. The closest explicit CBA programmes exist at the city-level through initiatives such as ACCCRN in South and Southeast Asia. However, this chapter also highlights that slum upgrading and resettlement programmes for the urban poor (types of settlement development planning) are accepted as manifestations of CBA in an urban context. Given this, it supports this research’s aim to look at how climate risks (namely climate change) are
addressed within settlement development planning programmes among the urban poor, to what extent they can be considered a form of urban CBA, and therefore how urban CBA in settlement development planning can be developed and/ or strengthened. The chapter concludes by recognising that CBA is an evolving concept and has lessons to learn from research and limitations and challenges (identified by practicing development agencies and academics) to redress.