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serving epistemic communities with different origins but very similar interests and conceptual frameworks (see below). This can be seen by the slowness with which IPCC included the term coping and ISDR the term adaptation in their respective glossaries (ISDR, 2004).
    Here adaptation is defined as: the process through which an actor is able to reflect upon and enact change in those practices and underlying institutions that generate root and proximate causes of risk, frame capacity to cope and further rounds of adaptation to climate change. Coping with climate change is defined as: the process through which established practices and underlying institutions are marshalled when confronted by the impacts of climate change.
    Adaptation includes both adaptive capacity and adaptive action as subcategories. Capacity drives scope for action, which in turn can foster or hinder future capacity to act. This is most keenly seen when adaptation requires the selling of productive assets (tools, cattle, property) thus limiting capacity for future adaptive action and recovery.
    Adaptive capacity has been conceptualised both as a component of vulnerability and as its inverse, declining as vulnerability increases (Cutter
et al.
, 2008). This distinction is important in designing methods for the measurement of adaptive capacity and vulnerability, which are generally conceived of as static attributes, and the subsequent targeting of investments to reduce risk. The distinction is less important for theoretical work and methods aimed at revealing vulnerability or adaptive capacity as dynamic qualities of social actors in history. For these projects more important is the recognition that vulnerability and adaptation interact and influence each other over time, shaped by flows of power, information and assets between actors. The relationship between vulnerability and adaptive capacity varies according to size and type of hazard risk and the position of the social unit under analysis within wider socio-ecological systems. Position matters as vulnerability and adaptive capacity at one scale can have profound and sometimes hidden implications for other scales. For example, a family in Barbados may benefit from living in a hurricane-proof house (low micro-vulnerability) but still be impacted by macro-economic losses shouldtourists be deterred by hurricane risk in an island whose economy specialises in tourism with limited diversity (low macro-adaptive capacity).
    The predominant understanding of adaptation is that while it is a distinct concept it is part of the wider notion of vulnerability. The IPCC conceptualises vulnerability as an outcome of susceptibility, exposure and adaptive capacity for any given hazard (and inadvertently compounds the definition through use of the term ‘to cope’!):
    Vulnerability is the degree to which a system is susceptible to, and unable to cope with, adverse effects of climate change, including climate variability and extremes. Vulnerability is a function of the character, magnitude, and rate of climate change and variation to which a system is exposed, its sensitivity, and its adaptive capacity. (IPCC, 2008:883)
    Exposure is usually indicated by geographical and temporal proximity to a hazard with susceptibility referring to the propensity for an exposed unit to suffer harm. Adaptation then can either reduce exposure or susceptibility. Adaptive actions to reduce exposure focus on improving ways of containing physical hazard (building sea walls, river embankments, reservoirs and so on); they can also include actions to shield an asset at risk from physical hazard (by seasonal or permanent relocation or strengthening the physical fabric of a building, infrastructure and so on). There is some contention here with individual studies including shielding under exposure or susceptibility. However, this is only problematic when assumptions are not made clear, preventing aggregation of findings (a specific concern for the IPCC