Political Dimensions of Climate Change Adaptation : Framing Financial Attributes in Pakistan

Abstract: The interest towards climate change adaptation has gradually increased from local tointernational levels around the globe. This is one reason that there is less than the dueattention paid previously, on its implementation, besides relatively lower levels offunding available for the adaptation related activities. To elaborate on the trickyrelationship between adaptation funding and policy priorities in the global South, thisthesis focuses on the case of Pakistan. Pakistan is one of the most climate changesprone countries with several events of climate change related disasters taking place onan annual basis. However, there is an extremely weak mechanism of climate changeadaptation that could help the vulnerable communities to resist the disaster impacts.The respective study findings suggest that the primary cause of this issue is the lack ofan effective climate change policy. The existing National Climate Change Policy ofPakistan (NCCP), is not a living document at this point, that can address the climatechange adaptation issues. The existing policy was not only drafted by the fundingagencies themselves, who enabled the formulation of the policy, but it was alsoproposed before the 18th constitutional amendment in the country, which producedsignificant changes. Since the 18th amendment (2010), the implementation of theadaptation policy has been affected due to the change in administrative power andauthority levels, from national to provincial. Another important aspect which isassociated with the adaptation of climate change is the politics behind the funding thatmay enter the country from international sources. The national policy does not provideany comprehensive guideline for the funding agencies regarding the adaptationpriorities, vulnerability and adaptive capacity of the locals, or the organization of funds atvarious scales. This leads the international funding agencies to lose their trust in thegovernment; and lead these agencies to set up their own channels for enabling thefunds to implement the projects on climate change adaptation or mitigation. Similarly,the lack of interest for the national government towards adaptation activities furtherdeviates the flow of funds into adaptation actions, and the focus remains overmitigation. This master’s thesis adopted the in-depth case study research strategy, andsemi structured interviews were conducted with 23 climate change experts, including2but not limited to policy makers and international organizations staff. The results of thestudy were organized in four major focused areas including, a) priorities in adaptation,b) actors of adaptation, c) question of scales, and d) vulnerability and adaptive capacityof the affected communities. This study concludes that climate change adaptation is aneglected topic in Pakistan, and the mishandling of adaptation funds, under the weakpolicy guidelines, end up in maladaptation.