Landscape change scenarios: Developing participatory tools for enhancing resilience to climate change

Impacts of climate change as well as adaptation and mitigation policies have been studied through their effects on individuals, societies, the economic sector, agriculture, and ecosystems. Since the environment is expected to change significantly as a consequence of global warming, the role of local communities in shaping a more resilient landscape is crucial. This paper focuses on regions that are highly susceptible to climate change impacts, with the aim to develop and test an interdisciplinary mixed-methods approach to the development of future landscape scenarios, combining: i) qualitative and quantitative methods; and ii) research-driven (exploratory) and participatory (normative) processes of scenario development. A research-driven business-as-usual scenario accounts for adopted and planned mandatory adaptation policies, while an optimistic scenario, developed through a combination of research-driven and participatory approaches, includes additional measures stemming from feasible local activities. While the differences between the impacts of both scenarios on the land use and landscape structure seem to be relatively subtle, the optimistic scenario driven by active stakeholders would in fact lead to a considerably more resilient landscape. The results show that the mixed-method approach is limited to some extent due to its labour/effort intensity, uncertainty in the projections of particular landscape element changes, and unpredictability in the durability of the participatory process and local activism. However, it encourages citizens in thinking about the future of the landscape threatened by the impacts of climate change, and increases their willingness to actively manage the landscape in a way leading to enhancing the resilience to climate change effects.