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Paper short abstract

Adaptation M&E systems in international climate finance have built an established set of knowlege practices that ledn authority to the knowledge and render adapation governable but in doing so they close down the epistemic space for more transformative futures.

Paper long abstract

The success of adaptation action is under increasing global scrutiny and the use of monitoring and evaluation systems for adaptation is perceived to be a key part of the adaptation cycle. M&E frameworks define what success looks like and put in place the systems for data to be collected and reported to wider stakeholders. These systems are deployed in multiple sites and are managed and shaped by a transnational policy community who work across these spaces on internationally funded adaptation projects. In this paper we identify three key passage points where adaptation results are collated – multilateral climate funds, national programmes and individual projects – and identify a set of common knowledge practices that have become stabilised. We call these the institutional epistemologies of adaptation M&E. Multiple sites across the epistemic infrastructure of adaptation projects share certain practices that allow this knowledge to be seen as authoritative. These practices are designed to be consensual and show very limited disagreement around results. The M&E systems are not opening up wider debate on adaptation progress and success due to the limited public practices and abstract forms of knowledge generated through these practices. We conclude that the epistemologies of adaptation M&E create a decontextualised ‘view from nowhere’ that obscures the unknown elements of adaptation success that might be found through a combination of more divergent epistemologies. Whilst in principle M&E systems have the potential to generate learning and reflection, they are also political objects embedded in the power relationships of their contexts.