Lessons from Some of the World’s Most Vulnerable: A Webinar Series Hosted by the Center for Environmental Policy

Adaptation and Development: The Worldwide Search for Policies to Address Climate Change in Vulnerable Communities

How can we get the international community, national and sub-national interests to accord adaptation a higher priority to the concept and its implementation? What does it mean for a nation to be “adapted” or resilient? Why has there been resistance to implementing a more effective set of adaptation policies internationally and within nations? How can we motivate the mainstreaming of adaptation into government and private sector projects and programs?

Todd A. Eisenstadt, Professor of Government and Director of Research, Center for Environmental Policy (CEP) at American University

Tamara Coger, Senior Associate, Climate Resilience. World Resources Institute

Assem Prakash, Walker Family Professor for the College of Arts and Sciences and Director of the Center for Environmental Politics at the University of Washington

Kanta Kumari Rigaud, Lead Environmental Specialist and Regional Climate Change Coordinator in the Africa Region, World Bank

Todd A. Eisenstadt is Professor of Government at American University and Director of Research at the Center for Environmental Policy (CEP). He studies the politics of climate adaptation and has co-authored Climate Change, Science, and the Politics of Shared Sacrifice (Oxford University Press 2021 forthcoming), and Who Speaks for Nature? Indigenous Movements, Public Opinion, and the Petro-State in Ecuador (Oxford University Press, 2019), based on a National Science Foundation-sponsored national survey in Ecuador. He has consulted for private sector organizations and the US government on related issues and spent 2019-20 on a Council on Foreign Relations Fellowship for Tenured Professors of International Affairs at the World Bank’s Development Research Group.

Tamara Coger is a Senior Associate in the World Resource Institute (WRI)’s Climate Resilience Practice. She helps to lead the Institute’s work on locally led adaptation and other research and programs focused on adaptation and resilience. Working with Global Commission on Adaptation, which recently released a comprehensive set of policy recommendations, Ms. Coger has supported the development and execution of its global agenda and political strategy. She previously served as the Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning advisor for WRI and has managed international development programs focused on climate, agriculture and food security.

Aseem Prakash is Professor of Political Science, the Walker Family Professor for the College of Arts and Sciences, and the Founding Director of the Center for Environmental Politics. Aseem Prakash is Professor of Political Science, the Walker Family Professor for the College of Arts and Sciences, and the Founding Director of the Center for Environmental Politics. He is the founding Editor Cambridge University Press Series in Business and Public Policy as well as the recently launched Cambridge University Press Elements in Organizational Response to Climate Change: Governments, Businesses, and Nonprofits. His recent awards include the American Political Science Association's 2020 Elinor Ostrom Career Achievement Award in recognition of "lifetime contribution to the study of science, technology, and environmental politics," the International Studies Association's 2019 Distinguished International Political Economy Scholar Award that recognizes "outstanding senior scholars whose influence and path-breaking intellectual work will continue to impact the field for years to come," and the European Consortium for Political Research Standing Group on Regulatory Governance's 2018 Regulatory Studies Development Award that recognizes a senior scholar who has made notable "contributions to the field of regulatory governance.

Kanta Kumari Rigaud is a Lead Environmental Specialist and Regional Climate Change Coordinator in the Africa Region of the World Bank Group. She is a leading expert on climate adaptation and resilience and works on climate policy, strategy and knowledge management. She led a multidisciplinary team on the Bank's pioneering flagship report on Groundswell - Preparing for Internal Climate Migration and continues to lead work on deeper dives on climate migration in West and East Africa. Most recently, she led the development of the World Bank’s Next Generation Africa Climate Business Plan which sets out a blueprint for ramping up climate action in the region. Dr. Kumari Rigaud serves as co-chair of the Technical Working Group on Environmental Change and Migration of KNOMAD - the Global Knowledge Partnership on Migration and Development.