The editors of International Development Planning Review (IDPR) have selected the following paper as the Featured Article in IDPR 47.3.

‘Climate change and adaptation through the human security lens: insights from the Mekong Delta’ by Phuong-Dung Le, Grazia Pacillo, Peter Läderach, Hoang Long and Han Van Dijk.

This article is available to read Open Access as part of LUP Open Planning.

When asked to describe the article and highlight its importance, author Phuong-Dung Le stated the following:

Climate change adaptation is often seen as a necessary and positive response to growing environmental hazards, particularly in regions on the frontline of climate change, like rural deltas. Yet, this view might be surprisingly restricted. While adaptation strategies aim to protect rural livelihoods, they can also introduce new risks and unintended consequences. This paper argues that to understand the impacts of climate change and adaptation, we need a broader evaluation framework to capture the complex and interconnected ways in which people experience and respond to climate change.

We propose using a human security lens to explore these dynamics. Human security is defined as “a condition in which people and communities have the capacity to respond to threats to their basic needs and rights, so that they can live with dignity”. It encompasses seven interrelated dimensions: economic, food, health, environmental, personal, community and political security. Human security helps us recognize how climate risks ripple across various areas of life and affect different groups in different ways.

Using the Mekong Delta in Vietnam as a case study, we examine both academic literature and qualitative interviews with farmers, community leaders and governmental officials to explore how climate risks and adaptation responses are shaping multiple aspects of human security. While the existing literature strongly emphasises the climate impacts on food and economic security, our findings suggest that other dimensions, such as environmental degradation, community tensions and access to clean water, are equally important but often overlooked.

In addition, these different dimensions are deeply interconnected. For example, freshwater scarcity caused by salinity intrusion not only affects agricultural yields (economic and food security) but also causes conflict between different groups (community security) and impacts health due to reduced water quality (health security). This interconnectedness highlights the risk of treating adaptation as a one-size-fits-all solution. Specific adaptation measures, such as infrastructure projects, can create new insecurities for some, even though they benefit others.

Our paper calls attention to inequities in how adaptation is experienced. Ethnic minority communities, such as the Khmer in the Mekong Delta, often face greater challenges in accessing resources and adapting to change. This is due to structural inequalities in access to knowledge, capital and decision-making processes. These findings highlight the need to move beyond top-down adaptation strategies and to design inclusive, context-sensitive and socially-aware interventions.

Applying a human security lens provides a more holistic and just way of understanding and responding to climate change. This approach takes into account the immediate risks posed by climate impacts as well as the unintended consequences of adaptation, including the possibility of maladaptation and conflict. Mainstreaming human security into adaptation planning, at both policy and community levels, can help ensure that climate responses are not only effective but also inclusive and sustainable in the long term.

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