Assembling climate knowledge. The role of local expertise

Abstract

The difference between indigenous knowledge and western science continues to be a central theme in the social studies of science. This paper investigates the use of climate knowledge in climate adaptation activities. The analysis is based on a case study of indigenous experts involved in practical operations dealing with risk of avalanches in an area particularly vulnerable to avalanches in northern Norway. We find that indigenous knowledge held by local area experts and western science overlap. From this we develop two lines of argument. Firstly that assemblages of climate adaptation is produced as collaborative guesswork related to coupling and negotiation of different types of knowledge in a decision context. Secondly, we discuss what such a practice means for the understanding of the relationship between climate knowledge and climate policy. By following different assemblages of climate knowledge we point to an alternative way of understanding a process of policy shaping in relation to climate adaptation: a sideways policy shaping process where what gets included or excluded and what is considered internal or external to a decision making context becomes evident.