Does Distributive Justice Improve Welfare Outcomes in Climate Adaptation? An Exploration Using an Agent-Based Model of a Stylized Social–Environmental System

Abstract

Scholars increasingly propose distributive justice as a means to foster effective and fair outcomes in climate adaptation. To advance the discussion on its place in climate policy, it is desirable to be able to quantitatively assess the effects of different principles of distribution on the well-being of unequally vulnerable individuals and groups. Here, we present an agent-based model of a stylized social–environmental system subject to an external stress such as a climate change impact, in which individuals with unequal access to resources attempt to fulfil an essential need through resource consumption. This causes environmental damage, and a balance must be found between the processes of resource consumption and environmental degradation to achieve well-being for people and stability for the environment. We operationalize different principles for redistributing resource access as interaction rules in the model and compare their tendency to allow such a balance to emerge. Our results indicate that while outcome patterns and effectiveness may vary among principles, redistribution generally improves well-being and system stability. We discuss some implications of our findings as they pertain to addressing the climate crisis and end by outlining the next steps for the research.