Keeping Cities Afloat: Climate Change Adaptation and Collaborative Governance at the Local Level

Abstract

The lack of a federal strategy in the United States for climate change adaptation leaves state and city governments with broad discretion to undertake appropriate measures. Yet, cities may be unable to adapt to climate change without external assistance. Fragmentation of authority in a federalist system has largely resulted in small jurisdictions that may be incapable of efficiently delivering public services. Collaboration allows cities to pool resources and work across boundaries to ameliorate problems, such as climate change. However, little is known about why and how collaborative governance may lead to better outputs and outcomes. Using the case of climate change adaptation in U.S. cities, this study seeks to understand collaborative governance better and its effects on sea level rise preparedness. Findings suggest that level of collaborative activity is positively associated with higher policy outputs and outcomes.

KEYWORDS:

• climate change
• cross-sector collaboration
• horizontal collaboration
• local government
• public management

Notes

Notes

1 The cities surveyed were located in the following U.S. states: Alabama, California, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Mississippi, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Texas, Virginia, and Washington

2 To check whether the exclusion of 36 cities that do not participate in the CRS introduces bias in the remaining sample, I compare the averages of these 36 cities with the 341 in the sample in terms of vulnerability to sea level rise, population, and household income. The excluded cities are representative of the sample in terms of population size and household income, while, on average, they are slightly less vulnerable to sea level rise (26% of population will be locked in below the high tide line by 2050 under the current GHG emissions scenario) than the entire sample (31%).

3 The assumption of proportional odds for the ordered logistic regression was tested using the Brant test. The test statistic for the model was insignificant, indicating that the proportional odds assumption was met.

Additional information

Funding

This work has been supported by the University Graduate School at Florida International University through the Dissertation Evidence Acquisition Fellowship and the Dissertation Year Fellowship.

Notes on contributors

Vaiva Kalesnikaite

Vaiva Kalesnikaite is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Public Administration at The College at Brockport, State University of New York. She holds a Ph.D. in Public Affairs from Florida International University. Her research focuses on collaborative governance, citizen participation, and environmental policy at the local level of government.