Influencing policy and action on Climate-Change adaptation - Climate Change Adaptation and Development: Transforming Paradigms and Practices - page 236

thus limiting their value' (2003:18). Several authors (Vogel and O'Brien 2006;
O'Brien and Vogel 2003; Ingram et al. 2002; Broad and Agrawala 2001; Roncoli
et al. 2001, 2000) have identified these constraints as relating to social inequities,
market forces, political instability and civil strife - gender inequality and social
exclusion, limited options available to farmers including credit, alternative
seeds, draft power, irrigation and land availability.
There are indeed many factors that limit effective linkages between research
and policy. Here we focus on the politics of interactions and the role of
power relations and interests in encouraging (or discouraging) collaborative
production and application of scientific knowledge in the making of climate-
change adaptation polices and plans in the agricultural sector. We ask whether
participation and interaction involving relevant actors in the research process
can help to narrow the gap between research to policy and action for improved
adaptation to climate change. Our chapter analyses the interactions between
researchers, policy-makers and smallholder farmers during initial research
design, developing policy plans from research findings, and implementing
actions resulting from this interactive policy process.
theoretical and analytical framing
We employ a 'three-lens' framework (Naess et al. 2011; IDS 2011; Chinsinga et al.
2011; IDS 2006; Keeley and Scoones 2003) to provide an analytical design for how
participatory action research could be combined with policy-process design and
application in improving adaptation to climate-changes impacts in agriculture.
This framework consists of three elements, or lenses: actors/organizations,
narratives/evidence, and politics/interests. The first element involves identifying
the actors/organizations involved in the policy process and, in our case, in the
participatory research process aimed at providing scientific research evidence.
Second, narratives are storylines that help to identify competing ways of viewing
a particular policy problem and provide understanding of a range of interests
(Naess et al. 2011). Examining the interaction among relevant actors helps to
make clear the underlying power dynamics and how actors go about negotiating
the inclusion of their interests in the research and policy process. This means
power 1 relations in the research process need to be acknowledged (Naess et al.
2011; Chinsinga et al. 2011; IDS 2006). The analysis can therefore provide entry
points for identifying policy spaces: 'moments, opportunities and channels
where citizens can act to potentially affect policies, discourses and decisions and
relationships that affect their lives and interests' (Gaventa 2006:26).
Using this framework enables sequential analysis covering the three
elements: first, identification of actors and putting them into appropriate
categories (e.g. researchers, policy-makers across multiple governance levels,
and policy implementers, including smallholder farmers); second, identification
and analysis of the narratives and evidence/arguments deployed by actors in
making claims; and third, identification and analysis of interests and politics of