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This chapter delves into adaptation options broadly classified as structural/physical, institutional and social. Building upon these, it focusses on adaptation forms: autonomous versus planned, reactive versus proactive, short run versus long run, private versus public and incremental versus transformational. In doing so, it draws attention to the complexity of climate change adaptation.

Over the past few years, mathematical and computational models of organizations have attracted a great deal of interest in various fields of scientific research (see Lin & Carley, 1993 for review). The mathematical models have focused on the problem of quantifying the structural (mis)match between organizations and their tasks. The notion of structural congruence has been generalized from the problem of optimizing distributed decision-making in structured decision networks (Pete, Pattipati, Levchuk, & Kleinman, 1998) to the multi-objective optimization problem of designing optimal organizational structures to complete a mission, while minimizing a set of criteria (Levchuk, Pattipati, Curry, & Shakeri, 1996, 1997, 1998). As computational models of decision-making in organizations began to emerge (see Carley & Svoboda, 1996; Carley, 1998; Vincke, 1992), the study of social networks (SSN) continued to focus on examining a network structure and its impact on individual, group, and organizational behavior (Wellman & Berkowitz, 1988). Most models, developed under the SSN, combined formal and informal structures when representing organizations as architectures (e.g., see Levitt et al., 1994; Carley & Svoboda, 1996). In addition, a large number of measures of structure and of the individual positions within the structure have been developed (Roberts, 1979; Scott, 1981; Wasserman & Faust, 1994; Wellman, 1991).

‘Planned relocation’ has emerged in the international climate policy arena as an ‘adaptation’ solution with the potential to enhance resilience, address underdevelopment and debunk age-old narratives around migration as a risk to peace and security. In 2018, Fiji became one of the first countries to develop Planned Relocation Guidelines, with upwards of 80 villages thought to require relocation over the coming years due to the impact of climate change. Through interviews carried out with representatives from organisations involved in planning for community relocations in Fiji, this chapter explores the creation of planned relocation as a form of climate change adaptation and development. Looking specifically at the value-based challenges of implementation in Fiji, this research provides insight into what happens when dominant international policy narratives play out in practice. Through the presentation of culturally nuanced ways of understanding the problem of climate-induced migration, this chapter invites policymakers to seek out these voices when devising displacement solutions.

In business environments characterized by intense competition, globalization, rapid technological diffusion, accelerated product life cycles, and evolving industry boundaries, the ability of firms to adapt effectively to their changing environments is a strategic imperative (Hitt, Keats, & DeMarie, 1998; Nadler & Tushman, 1999). The exhibition of strategic adaptability – the ability of a firm to alter its alignment with the environment through reactive and proactive behaviors (Evans, 1991) – is a function of the goodness-of-fit that exists between the capabilities of a firm and the demands imposed by its relevant industry context (Burgelman & Grove, 1996). When firm capabilities are well aligned with industry success factors, those capabilities constitute strategic assets for the firm, or resources that lead to the achievement of competitive success in that context (Amit & Schoemaker, 1993). The possession of strategic assets thus contributes to a state of adaptation, defined by Chakravarthy (1982) as a state in which an organization exhibits the capacity to survive the conditions of its changing environment. Because of the constantly shifting nature of the environment, a state of adaptation is not a permanent settling point for the organization, but rather a moving target for the organization as it attempts to remain “mapped on” to the exigencies of the environment.

Climate change is projected to bring a range of changes in temperature, precipitation patterns, and sea level. As a result, widespread occurrence of floods, cyclones, droughts, cold and heat waves, etc. are projected with uneven distribution in time and spatial scales (Rosenzweig et al., 2007). These changes can manifest in the form of long-term slow changes in the mean state of the climate and sudden changes in the extremes of the climate (Carter et al., 2007). The sudden severe changes can have high impacts with widespread devastation, severely impacting years of developmental efforts in many vulnerable countries.

On the path to accomplishing task work, teams may face disruptive events like budget issues, equipment failures, and membership change that trigger adaptation. While recently researchers have clarified the team adaptation nomological network, our objective is to extend theory by providing a roadmap about various ways in which temporal considerations may complicate the impact of adaptation triggers on team adaptation and in turn adaptive outcomes.

We present three adaptation temporal considerations (i.e., timing, duration, and frequency) that may change the way team adaptation unfolds in response to a given adaptation trigger. We further explore and offer propositions about how the impact of adaptation timing, adaptation duration, and adaptation frequency differ by the type of adaptation trigger (i.e., task-based or team-based) experienced by the team.

By examining adaptation to task-based or team-based triggers from a temporal perspective researchers may better explain why the timing of when the team adapts across its lifecycle (adaptation timing), how long the team takes to adapt (adaptation duration), and the recurrent need to adapt (adaptation frequency) is more or less likely to lead to positive adaptive performance outcomes.

Organizations may benefit from setting up teams for success by helping members understand that there are inherent differences in the adaptation triggers they face including temporal expectations. Organizations may see value in providing initial and on-going support to teams so they are better able to adapt when needed and mitigate negative effects due to adaptation timing, adaptation duration, and adaption frequency.

This study provides a comprehensive framework of adaptation in triadic business relationship settings in the service sector. The framework is based on the industrial network approach (see, e.g., Axelsson & Easton, 1992; Håkansson & Snehota, 1995a). The study describes how adaptations initiate, how they progress, and what the outcomes of these adaptations are. Furthermore, the framework takes into account how adaptations spread in triadic relationship settings. The empirical context is corporate travel management, which is a chain of activities where an industrial enterprise, and its preferred travel agency and service supplier partners combine their resources. The scientific philosophy, on which the knowledge creation is based, is realist ontology. Epistemologically, the study relies on constructionist processes and interpretation. Case studies with in-depth interviews are the main source of data.

This paper deals with the organizing of interactive product development. Developing products in interaction between firms may provide benefits in terms of specialization, increased innovation, and possibilities to perform development activities in parallel. However, the differentiation of product development among a number of firms also implies that various dependencies need to be dealt with across firm boundaries. How dependencies may be dealt with across firms is related to how product development is organized. The purpose of the paper is to explore dependencies and how interactive product development may be organized with regard to these dependencies.

The analytical framework is based on the industrial network approach, and deals with the development of products in terms of adaptation and combination of heterogeneous resources. There are dependencies between resources, that is, they are embedded, implying that no resource can be developed in isolation. The characteristics of and dependencies related to four main categories of resources (products, production facilities, business units and business relationships) provide a basis for analyzing the organizing of interactive product development.

Three in-depth case studies are used to explore the organizing of interactive product development with regard to dependencies. The first two cases are based on the development of the electrical system and the seats for Volvo’s large car platform (P2), performed in interaction with Delphi and Lear respectively. The third case is based on the interaction between Scania and Dayco/DFC Tech for the development of various pipes and hoses for a new truck model.

The analysis is focused on what different dependencies the firms considered and dealt with, and how product development was organized with regard to these dependencies. It is concluded that there is a complex and dynamic pattern of dependencies that reaches far beyond the developed product as well as beyond individual business units. To deal with these dependencies, development may be organized in teams where several business units are represented. This enables interaction between different business units’ resource collections, which is important for resource adaptation as well as for innovation. The delimiting and relating functions of the team boundary are elaborated upon and it is argued that also teams may be regarded as actors. It is also concluded that a modular product structure may entail a modular organization with regard to the teams, though, interaction between business units and teams is needed. A strong connection between the technical structure and the organizational structure is identified and it is concluded that policies regarding the technical structure (e.g. concerning “carry-over”) cannot be separated from the management of the organizational structure (e.g. the supplier structure). The organizing of product development is in itself a complex and dynamic task that needs to be subject to interaction between business units.

Private household insurance has been relatively uncommon among households in Samoa to date. Meanwhile, numerous other adaptation interventions are also being implemented, including community-based adaptation (CBA) projects which draw on the skills of the community to address the climate change-related hazards that are expected to affect local communities. Through semi-structured interviews with community members from the urban/peri-urban area around Apia (with and without insurance) and an insurance company representative, this research explores private household natural perils insurance uptake in Samoa and the effect that the uptake of this insurance has on household engagement in other climate change adaptation (CCA) strategies such as CBA projects. Findings suggest that individuals whose homes are already insured with natural perils insurance are more likely to express more individualistic values or beliefs than those without natural perils insurance. Insured homeowners commonly framed adaptation as a technical challenge, with insurance being part of the technical and expert-led approach to prepare for, manage and recover from extreme events. In contrast, householders without insurance perceived CCA as less of a technical task and more of a social process. Those individuals with private household natural perils insurance coverage (in keeping with their more individualistic values) reported that they were less engaged in CBA projects compared to participants without insurance (who held more communalistic values). Given the importance of household participation in CBA projects, an increased uptake of insurance may have problematic outcomes for the adaptive capacity of the broader community.

Climate change was identified as an urgent global problem that requires governments to unite their efforts to prepare for potential climate risks at the First World Climate Conference in 1979. This recognition led to the establishment of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in 1988 to assess the magnitude and timing of changes and estimate their impacts. The IPCC published its First Assessment Report in 1990, which became a basis for negotiations on a climate change convention under the United Nations General Assembly. Between February 1991 and May 1992, the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee for a Framework Convention on Climate Change met five times under the auspices of the General Assembly, and the Convention text was adopted on May 9, 1992 at the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development, held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, where 154 states signed. The Convention entered into force on March 21, 1994. It has near universal membership with 194 Parties (member countries) having ratified (UNFCCC, 2006).