Coastal resilience: assisting communities in the face of climate change : a panel discussion

"On November 23, 2010, Oregon Sea Grant facilitated a teleconference discussion among 13 coastal resilience experts to exchange information, experience, and ideas that ultimately could help coastal communities become more resilient, in short by identifying some roles and strategies for both research and community practice ... To set the stage, two dominant definitions in resilience studies -- engineering resilience and ecological resilience -- were recapped. Participants voiced several concerns over the limitations of these definitions, such as: certain socioeconomic groups may be marginalized by looking at the entire system and not its subcomponents; too much emphasis may be placed on returning to a previous state, rather than adapting and evolving to a new state; and focusing too much on immediate hazards may not adequately address the longer and slower variables that will make for greater resilience over time. Discussants expressed a variety of factors that influence how resilient individual communities can be, including social variables at different scales -- for example, social capital (e.g., networks) and national, state, and local policies and laws. Zoning laws determine where both homeowners and businesses build, for example; people want and need to live where amenities are present. In addition, insurance rates and property taxes both potentially encourage or reinforce detrimental behaviors, such as building in areas prone to inundation or erosion. For some communities -- those that have already been hit hard or are disproportionately vulnerable to climate change impacts -- outside assistance may be necessary. This last point raised a difficult ethical question: how much of a financial burden is too much for coastal communities to extend to the rest of society, particularly for risky and costly coastal actions (e.g., siting buildings in hazardous areas)? ... The discussion closed with ideas for next steps, such as pursuing further similar discussions (including with additional specialists from such groups as the insurance industry), drafting one or more white papers, and convening the group at a relevant conference."--Executive summary.Cover title.This archived document is maintained by the State Library of Oregon as part of the Oregon Documents Depository Program. It is for informational purposes and may not be suitable for legal purposes.Includes bibliographical references (page 23).Also available online at the Oregon Documents Repository.This report was prepared by Oregon Sea Grant under award number # NA10OAR4170059, Amend. No. 1 (project number R/CC-14) from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's National Sea Grant College Program, U.S. Department of Commerce, and by appropriations made by the Oregon State Legislatur