Equity and societal capacity for action in climate change scenarios

Climate change research relies heavily on scenarios to explore possible futures, yet they are still too often used as purely emissions or temperature trajectories. In this presentation, I showcase scenario-based studies and conceptual advances with scenario frameworks to argue that scenarios can and should be used for joint assessments of climate impacts and the evolving capacities of societies to adapt and mitigate, while placing equity, vulnerability, and feasibility at the center.

I will first discuss scenarios as representations of alternative socioeconomic development pathways, not just climate outcomes. By systematically varying progress in areas such education, health, poverty reduction, governance, scenario analysis can illuminate how different “worlds” of human development translate into very different levels of climate risk, even under similar global warming levels. This work shows that indicators of adaptive capacity (i.e., societies' or individuals' ability to implement adaptation actions, which depends on access to resources and decision-making power) are key for assessing future impacts.

A second focus will be on using scenarios to assess the capacity of societies to undertake mitigation. This strand of research highlights how scenario frameworks can incorporate multiple dimensions of feasibility—social, economic, technological, institutional, and political—rather than treating all mitigation pathways as equally implementable. This allows us to ask where and under what conditions rapid emissions reductions are more feasible, where feasibility constraints are most binding, and how these constraints interact with development and equity.

A particular focus will be on incorporating gender inequality into scenario design and assessment. Drawing on studies that link gender gaps in education, labor force participation, political representation, and access to resources with vulnerability to climate extremes and air quality impacts, I will discuss how gendered power structures shape both the exposure and the capacity to respond.

Finally, I will outline a research agenda for the next generation of scenarios: ones that place societal capacity, equity, and feasibility on equal footing with emissions and temperature, and that are explicitly designed to inform debates on loss and damage, just transitions, climate finance, and development planning in a warming world.