How networked organisations build capacity for anticipatory governance in South East Asian deltas

Building capacity for governments to make inferences about future developments enhances their ability to anticipate and plan for climate change adaptation. This study examines the question: how do networked organisations build capacity for anticipatory governance through project-based interactions? We analyse a global network of organisations that mobilise climate and hydrological modelling technologies into the Chao Phraya and Ayeyarwaddy deltas. The methodology innovatively combines ethnographic data with policy analysis and social network analysis. Findings suggest that organisations consolidate technology and knowledge transfer through a global network. However, their governance effect in enhancing anticipatory decision making is found to be marginal at the local level. We argue that anticipatory governance practices need a balancing of foresight tools and techniques with local institutional arrangements in order to be effective. We further demonstrate that technology transfer projects need to be backed up with social and strategic capacity building in order to nurture consistent anticipatory governance in different cultural contexts. We conclude that preventive actions, together with transparent operational response frameworks, could significantly improve resilience and adaptability of local knowledge systems and institutions dealing with climate change adaptation. Such integration could enable anticipatory response measures to better manage risk, as well as increase institutional cooperation for long term environmental planning

Renewable Energy Transition Initiatives and Networks

This data was produced for a research study on Global Innovation Networks working on the energy transitions towards low-carbon sustainable development. The data was produced and analysed with the purpose of understanding current and global energy transition initiatives directed to East Africa, with particular attention of Ethiopia and Uganda. Data shows abundant initiatives and high fragmentation

Situating and Understanding Global Delta-knowledge Networks in Relation to Other Global Knowledge Networks, 2016-2019

The project starting point was the realisation that the rules of the game for producing effective and authoritative environmental knowledge and technologies are radically different today as compared to the past. For instance, the green turn (Disco 2002) has led to a radical re-appraisal and re-definition of environmental problems and solutions, and has produced serious challenges to established ways of understanding (and dealing with) society–nature interactions as well as the kinds of information, data and knowledge used to inform decisions. Therefore, the kinds of data collected for the project were defined by a research design following a mixed-methods approach drawing mainly from social anthropology, social network methods, and policy analysis. The design followed an epistemological position of pragmatism. The research design also departs from the general interest in studying social practices, organisations and networks. This research applied an interdisciplinary focus to contexts, situations and actions which inform antecedent conditions. The situations of inquiry grounded the research strategy as well as the kinds of data collected. Data was gathered from observational and open interviews in combination with desktop research, social network analysis and policy analysis throughout the duration of the project. Ethnographic observations and interviews: For the given period, the interviews concern European and Asian experts, working at such institutes as the UK Met Office, working on climate models, but also on international organisations conducting technology transfer activities and hydrological technology transfer from one context to another (including in The Netherlands, Denmark, Thailand and Myanmar. The purpose of the interviews was to get an understanding of how these models are set up, what their history of development is, and most importantly, how they are disseminated to the South-East Asia. Secondary data: Data was collected during fieldwork and subsequently applying desktop research. The documentation was classified according to themes and coded to trace expert knowledge, and narratives of expert assessments contained in the reports analysed. The data contains text and documents coded and analysed in Nvivo, including reports, publications and other types of grey literature. Social Network Data for Analysis: We applied qualitative methods of coding, analysis and interpretation of data from the interviews, participant observation and field notes. Secondly, we combined the interview data with secondary data (e.g., government reports, project reports and MoUs), policy analysis (e.g., policy problems, stakeholders, institutional frameworks and uncertainties) and social network analysis (e.g., identifying connections, measuring centrality and selecting a cluster for further analysis). Accordingly, the descriptions of interactions between organisations and events served to map a global network with which to identify activities and evaluate the performance and behaviour of such connections. Notably, we paid attention to organisations with an active presence in Thailand and Myanmar dealing with climate and hydrological modelling and conducted Social Network Analysis using three measures of network centrality: Closeness centrality, Betweenness centrality and Eigenvector centrality. Centrality is a measure of the information about the relative importance of nodes and edges in a graph. Centrality measures the number of links incident on a node and is used to identify nodes that have the highest number of connections in the network. High degree centrality represents a crucial role in the information flow and cohesiveness of the network; thus, such nodes are considered central to the network due to their role in the flow of information. Using a total network of 198 organisations identified and added to the dataset for analysis.This project innovatively combined science and technology studies (STS) with the anthropology of development to interrogate how uncertainties are understood and dealt with in environmental planning. We used deltas in South and Southeast Asia as our research object. These deltas are dynamic and densely populated environments typified by agricultural intensification, rapid urbanisation and vulnerability to climate change. Recognition of multiple (definitions of) deltas informs the main project hypothesis: much delta knowledge used in the South comes from specific epistemic communities, whose knowledge travels through and because of global development-cooperation networks. We traced these networks and travels through space and time to critically examined how delta knowledges are generated and gain authority, and their hybridisation with 'local' knowledge and governance practices. We did this for four deltas with diverging cultural and historical trajectories and contemporary dynamics: the Ganges-Brahmaputra and the Mekong serve as contrasting reference against which the Chao Phraya and the Irrawaddy were studied in greater detail. Engaging with contemporary debates in STS, the analysis has been used to re-consideration expertise and experts' role in dealing with uncertainties. This in turn informs the formulation of guiding principles for productive and responsible ways of environmental knowing and planning at different scales through a variety of knowledge outputs and publications.</p