Towards a Climate resilient Future Together : Tools for Engaging Citizens for a Better Future

Although many local authorities underline the important role of citizens in climate adaptation, many experience difficulties with organizing citizen participation in a way that is meaningful to both citizens and policymakers. Climate change is for many simply not a top priority. Besides, the future is often rather abstract to people, citizens in particular. We argue that practical tools are needed to help citizens structure the process of thinking about and designing the future of their living environment under the impacts of climate change. The toolbox Towards a climate-resilient future together offers practical foresight methods and tools for organizing citizen participation in the process of building climate-resilient futures. It provides an overview of the state the art of and hands-on guidance for executing participatory foresight methods and showcases some of the lessons learned from several international research programs on citizen engagement. In doing so, the toolbox can assist practitioners, students and academics concerned with the question of how local communities in urban and rural areas could adapt to climate change impacts and become more resilient in the future. It is suitable for readers without any experience in citizen participation and/or foresight, while more experienced readers will find innovative combinations of methods and tools that are unique within the field of citizen participation and foresight..

Mandy van den Ende MSc. (she/her) is a PhD researcher in environmental governance at Utrecht University’s Copernicus Institute of Sustainable Development. She obtained a bachelor's degree in social sciences at the University of Amsterdam and a research master's degree in Sustainable Development at Utrecht University. Mandy has been a GEO-fellow for UNEP's sixth Global Environment Outlook (GEO-6) report and Coordinating Lead Author of GEO-6 for Youth. As a Junior Researcher, she has been involved in several projects on the governance of climate change adaptation in the Dutch context. She has special interest in governance issues stemming from wicked problems/creeping crises.

Dr. Dries Hegger (he/him) is an Assistant Professor in Regional Water and Climate Governance at Utrecht University’s Copernicus Institute of Sustainable Development. He studies modes of environmental governance and their relationship with resilient and sustainable urban development. He has been involved in several national and international projects on flood risk governance (EU-FP7 STAR-FLOOD; JPI-CLIMATE TRANS-ADAPT), knowledge co-creation in regional climate adaptation projects (Dutch National Research Program Knowledge for Climate), relationships between water companies and consumers (funded by Dutch drinking water companies) and on innovation in wastewater management systems in a Western context (nationally funded). The study of citizen engagement and science-policy interactions related to sustainable land use issues has always been a core feature of his work.

Dr. Heleen Mees (she/her) is an Assistant Professor in Local Sustainability Governance at Utrecht University’s Copernicus Institute of Sustainable Development. Her field of expertise is urban climate governance, with a focus on the roles of citizens and communities in climate change governance. She has researched the division of responsibilities for urban climate adaptation between public authorities and private actors, and the legitimacy, fairness and accountability of local governance arrangements for climate change adaptation. Furthermore, she has done research on citizen participation in climate adaptation governance. Her current research activities focus on the roles of citizens in climate adaptation governance, the roles of citizen initiatives and the facilitative role of local governments in supporting citizen initiatives for climate change governance.

Dr. Arjan Wardekker (he/him) is a Senior Researcher on Resilience & Climate Adaptation at University of Bergen's Centre for the Study of the Sciences and the Humanities. He's a Principal Investigator on i.a. the projects CoCliServ and SeMPER-Arctic (Sense Making, Place Attachment and Extended Networks as Sources of Resilience in the Arctic), and coordinating PI on Visual Framing of Climate Change. His research focuses on urban & community resilience and developing climate adaptation & knowledge with those communities, with applications in global cities, delta regions and the Arctic. Particular interests include: framing & narratives, science-policy-society interfaces, visualisation & communication, and governance under uncertainty & surprise. 

Dr. Joost Vervoort (he/him) is an Associate Professor of Foresight and Anticipatory Governance at the Copernicus Institute of Sustainable Development, Utrecht University. For the last 15 years, he has led major international scenario development and policy guidance processes in the context of climate change – across Asia, Africa, the Americas and Europe. Joost specializes in the use of foresight approaches as a way to help support sustainability transformations. In particular, he focuses on the politics of using the future to guide the present. Joost also focuses on the role of games as a way to engage with and experience diverse futures.