Adaptive Capacity, Adaptive Governance and Resilience - Climate Change and Water Governance: Adaptive Capacity in Chile and Switzerland - page 37

processes of experimentation, learning, collaboration, and monitoring that attempt
to reduce uncertainty' (Folke et al. 2005 ; Nelson et al. 2007 ; Olsson et al. 2004b ;
Plummer and Armitage 2007 ; Huitema et al. 2009 , in Engle et al. 2011 ) . Constructive
methods of dealing with and managing uncertainty are integrated into adaptive man-
agement approaches by adopting learning techniques (social and policy learning, sce-
nario planning etc.), so that systems may respond to change and unknown conditions
(Herrfahrdt-Pähle 2010b ; Huntjens et al. 2011 ; Pahl-Wostl et al. 2007c ) . At the
heart of policy learning approaches is the premise that institutions can use their past
experiences and learning from those past experiences to guide their responses and
actions to future challenges (Sabatier 1988; Bennett and Howlett 1992 in Huntjens
et al. 2011 ) .
Learning is highlighted in a number of studies as a vital component for building
experience and flexibility to cope with uncertainty and change (Berkes et al. 2003 ;
Folke et al. 2005 ; Nelson et al. 2007 ; Olsson et al. 2004a ; Pahl-Wostl 2007b ) .
Learning in the field of adaptive management and governance is seen as a vital
component, or supplement, to 'knowledge generation', which in and of itself is not
enough to build adaptive capacity in social-ecological systems, but needs to be
complemented with the requisite institutional framework that fosters learning as a
means to navigate a constantly changing environmental and social context (Folke
et al. 2005 ) .
Adaptive management also promotes the role of bridging organisations (net-
works, associations, cross-sectoral partnerships, political coalitions, social move-
ments) and collective learning amongst others, as a core component in sharing
learning experiences and findings and for promoting active continuous learning as a
means of continuously improving and adapting management strategies (Pahl-Wostl
et al. 2007a ). This becomes particularly relevant in relation to climate impacts,
where lack of information and high uncertainty about potential impacts is twinned
with long decision making time-frames for adaptation (Keeney and McDaniels
2001 ). This raises the potential for actors to become locked into a set of responses
that may no longer be suitable further down the line (Keeney and McDaniels 2001 ;
Tompkins and Adger 2005 ) . Keeney and McDaniels ( 2001 ) propose a combination
of shorter timeframes in which to set policy objectives (less than 20 years) together
with greater emphasis on testing and evaluation in order to overcome these
challenges.
The learning related tools promoted within adaptive management provide a
means to allow greater flexibility in the system to cope with the connectivity between
processes and scales. Related to social learning and learning by doing, is the con-
cept of institutional learning (Berkes and Folke 2001 ), which takes place at the
institutional rather than individual level (Lee 1993 ) . Concerning natural resources,
institutional learning involves drawing from and carrying forward into the future
memories and experience which provide the context for making modifications of
resource-use rules. This experience may integrate local and traditional as well as
scientific and formal forms of information and knowledge to develop strategies to
respond to environmental change (Berkes and Folke 2001 ) .