Revisiting the Relationship between Vulnerability and Climate Action

Giorgos Galanis; Giorgio Richiuti; Benjamin Tippet

doi:10.2139/ssrn.4900038

Revisiting the Relationship between Vulnerability and Climate Action

Giorgos Galanis, Giorgio Richiuti, Benjamin Tippet

Research output: Working paper/Preprint › Working paper

Abstract

The existing literature assumes that vulnerability and climate action on mitigation are positively related, as vulnerable countries have more incentives to prevent future damages. Considering three dimensions capturing climate action, namely international pledges, implementing laws and outcomes on emissions; this paper argues that in fact the opposite is true - vulnerable countries are less likely to take action to mitigate emissions. Our explanation for this is related to what we refer to as a wealth effect that has been overlooked in the literature on vulnerability and climate action. Vulnerability is not only a function of exposure to disasters but also of the adaptive capacity of a country which includes several dimensions of what can be considered as the overall wealth of the country. Therefore for the same level of disasters, countries with less wealth will be more vulnerable. At the same time mitigation is relatively more expensive for these countries, meaning they may not take action even if they have more incentives to do so.

Original language	English
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4900038
Publication status	Published - 2024

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Revisiting the Relationship between Vulnerability and Climate Action

Abstract

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