Institutions for climate change: A method to assess the inherent characteristics of institutions to enable the adaptive capacity of society. Available on Glogov website http://glogov.org/?pageid=4

Climate change calls for institutions that promote the adaptive capacity of society and al-low society to modify its institutions at a rate commensurate with the rapid rate of envi-ronmental change. Climate change potentially brings continuous and unpredictable changes to local weather patterns, water supplies and sea levels. Institutions, traditionally conservative and reactive, will now have to be designed in a way that they support social actors to proactively respond through planned processes and deliberate steps but also through cherishing and encouraging spontaneous and autonomous change that is rapid enough to deal with the impacts, as well as allow for institutional redesign. This paper addresses the question: How can the inherent characteristics of institutions to stimulate the adaptive capacity of society to climate change from local through to national level be assessed? On the basis of a literature review and several brainstorm sessions, this paper presents six criteria: Variety, learning capacity, space for planned and innovative autonomous action, leadership, availability of resources and fair governance. Together these six criteria form the Scorecard for Adaptive Capacity. This card can help academ-ics and social actors to assess the inherent characteristics of institutions to stimulate the adaptive capacity of society to respond to climate change; and to focus on whether and how institutions need to be redesigned