Governing increasingly unmanageable coasts: Climate change, sea-level rise, and policy challenges in Florida's coastal cities

Abstract

Accelerating climate change is fundamentally reshaping risks in coastal cities worldwide, with Florida emerging as one of the most exposed and instructive cases. This study examines why Florida's coastal cities are becoming increasingly difficult to manage under conditions of sea-level rise, intensifying extreme events, and compound flooding, despite extensive scientific knowledge and policy attention. Using a scoping review methodology, the paper synthesizes interdisciplinary literature from climate science, urban studies, and governance scholarships, alongside government reports and coastal planning documents published between 2000 and 2025. The analysis integrates physical climate hazards, urban exposure, governance responses, policy performance, and social outcomes within an integrative conceptual framework. Findings indicate that climate risks in Florida are no longer episodic but structural, driven by accelerating sea-level rise, recurrent tidal flooding, and interacting hazards that increasingly overwhelm infrastructure and planning systems. At the same time, coastal governance remains constrained by fragmented institutional arrangements, short-term political horizons, development path dependency, and legal and economic pressures that favor incremental adaptation over transformative change. These constraints contribute to persistent policy gaps, including continued development in high-risk coastal zones, reliance on infrastructure hardening with diminishing returns, and delayed engagement with managed retreat. The review further demonstrates that governance failures produce uneven outcomes, disproportionately affecting low-income populations, renters, and elderly residents while prioritizing asset protection. Reframing failure as systemic, the study clarifies limits of incremental adaptation and presents Florida as a warning case for coastal regions globally.