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Abstract
Cities face intersectional challenges implementing climate adaptation policy. This research contributes to scholarship dedicated to understanding how policy implementation affects socially vulnerable groups, with the overarching goal of promoting justice and equity in climate policy implementation. We apply a novel framework that integrates social justice theory and the advocacy coalition framework to incrementally assess just climate adaptation in Boston, Massachusetts in the United States. Boston made an ambitious commitment to address equity as part of its climate planning and implementation efforts. In this paper, we evaluate the first implementation stage over the period 2016–2019 during which Boston developed coastal resilience plans for three neighborhoods. Despite Boston's commitment to equity, we find injustice was nevertheless reproduced through representation and coalition dynamics, the framing of problems and solutions, and a failure to recognize the priorities and lived experiences of city residents. The assessment framework presented can be adapted to evaluate how other climate adaptation initiatives advance social justice and highlights the need for incremental evaluation over short time periods to inform ongoing implementation efforts.
Department
Natural Resources and the Environment; Sociology; Health Management and Policy
Publication Date
11-21-2022
Journal Title
Frontiers in Sustainable Cities
Publisher
Frontiers
Digital Object Identifier (DOI)
Document Type
Article
Recommended Citation
Malloy JT, Ashcraft CM, Kirshen P, Safford TG, Aytur SA and Rogers SH (2022) Implementing just climate adaptation policy: An analysis of recognition, framing, and advocacy coalitions in Boston, U.S.A. Front. Sustain. Cities 4:928230. doi: 10.3389/frsc.2022.928230
Rights
© 2022 Malloy, Ashcraft, Kirshen, Safford, Aytur and Rogers.
Included in
Environmental Policy Commons, Health Policy Commons, Natural Resources and Conservation Commons, Natural Resources Management and Policy Commons, Place and Environment Commons, Politics and Social Change Commons, Public Policy Commons
Comments
This is an open access article published by Frontiers in Frontiers in Sustainable Cities in 2022, available online: https://dx.doi.org/10.3389/frsc.2022.928230
This publication is an outcome from Jeffrey T. Malloy's PhD dissertation, which can be viewed here: https://scholars.unh.edu/dissertation/2627/