Maria Carmen Lemos
Biographic Data
| ID | 894924 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Maria Carmen Lemos |
| GIVEN NAMES | Maria Carmen |
| FAMILY NAME | Lemos |
| SIGNATURE | LEMOS M C |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Michigan |
| ORCID | 0000-0001-6686-730X |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 65 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 931 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 65 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1998 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 15 |
Exploring climate-induced migration impacts on urban growth
Linking Boundary Organizations to Coproduce Actionable Knowledge: A Case Study of Ice Forecasting for Great Lakes Navigation
Navigating the Great Lakes during icy conditions poses significant safety challenges for the shipping sector. Available ice information is uncertain and fragmented, and navigators must seek out multiple sources for information at the spatial and temporal scales they require, if the information is available at all. Navigators have expressed that they require more highly localized and easily usable information for current and predicted ice conditio…
The next phase of Wires Climate Change
Geographic distribution of articles published in WIREs Climate Change in the last 5 years, with bubbles scaled by the number of articles per country. Climate change is one of the grand socio-environmental challenges of our time, influencing almost all aspects of life on Earth. The multifaceted and all-encompassing nature of the problem means we need to understand climate change in multi-, inter- and transdisciplinary ways. When WIREs Climate Chan…
The role of rural circular migration in shaping weather risk management for smallholder farmers in India, Nepal, and Bangladesh
A research agenda for the science of actionable knowledge: Drawing from a review of the most misguided to the most enlightened claims in the science-policy interface literature
Linking science with action affords a prime opportunity to leverage greater societal impact from research and increase the use of evidence in decision-making. Success in these areas depends critically upon processes of producing and mobilizing knowledge, as well as supporting and making decisions. For decades, scholars have idealized and described these social processes in different ways, resulting in numerous assumptions that now variously guide…
Science communication in Congress: For what use
These findings support the proposed model and highlight the importance of staff scientific fluency and the decision-making context for science communication in Congress
Radical interventions for climate-impacted systems
Challenges of managing harmful algal blooms in US drinking water systems
Scaling up co-produced climate-driven decision support tools for agriculture
Risk? Crisis? Emergency? Implications of the new climate emergency framing for governance and policy
The term “climate emergency” represents a new phase in climate change framing that many hope will invigorate more climate action. Yet there has been relatively little discussion of how the new emergency framing might shape broader governance and policy. In this advanced review, we critically review and synthesize existing literature on crisis and emergency to inform our understanding of how this new shift might affect governance and policy. Speci…
Understanding knowledge use for sustainability
Scientific research is increasingly motivated to produce knowledge for sustainability decision-making and action. This is driving some funders, academic institutions, and researchers to pursue research approaches that are more interactive with potential users of the knowledge created. Yet despite compelling evidence that these more collaborative approaches lead to increased use, it remains unclear what constitutes use and how to evaluate its soci…
Commentary: First, do no harm: Scaling usable knowledge for just and equitable outcomes
Global Environmental Change: 30 Years of Interdisciplinary Research on the Human and Policy Dimensions of Environmental Change
Political dynamics and governance of World Heritage ecosystems
Who are boundary spanners and how can we support them in making knowledge more actionable in sustainability fields
Actionable knowledge and the art of engagement
The exigencies of transboundary water security: Insights on community resilience
Evaluating Knowledge to Support Climate Action: A Framework for Sustained Assessment. Report of an Independent Advisory Committee on Applied Climate Assessment
As states, cities, tribes, and private interests cope with climate damages and seek to increase preparedness and resilience, they will need to navigate myriad choices and options available to them. Making these choices in ways that identify pathways for climate action that support their development objectives will require constructive public dialogue, community participation, and flexible and ongoing access to science- and experience-based knowle…
The Closer, the Better? Untangling Scientist–Practitioner Engagement, Interaction, and Knowledge Use
Scholarship on climate information use has focused significantly on engagement with practitioners as a means to enhance knowledge use. In principle, working with practitioners to incorporate their knowledge and priorities into the research process should improve information uptake by enhancing accessibility and improving users’ perceptions of how well information meets their decision needs, including knowledge credibility, understandability, and …
The black box of power in polycentric environmental governance
Failure to address unsustainable global change is often attributed to failures in conventional environmental governance. Polycentric environmental governance—the popular alternative—involves many centres of authority interacting coherently for a common governance goal. Yet, longitudinal analysis reveals many polycentric systems are struggling to cope with the growing impacts, pace, and scope of social and environmental change. Analytic shortcomin…
Usable environmental knowledge from the perspective of decision-making: The logics of consequentiality, appropriateness, and meaningfulness
Co-producing science for sustainability: Can funding change knowledge use
There is widespread belief that meaningful interaction between scientists and practitioners, or co-production, increases use of scientific knowledge about sustainability and environmental change. Although funders are increasingly encouraging co-production, there have been few empirical studies assessing the outcomes of these efforts in shaping knowledge use. In this study, we systematically analyze research project reports (n = 120) and interview…
Extreme Events, Climate Change and Adaptation in the State of São Paulo
In this paper, we analyze secondary data from surveys focusing on climate change and adaptation in Sao Paulo municipalities. The survey was completed by municipal actors who work in 332 of the 645 municipalities in the State. In this paper, we use a theoretical framework on urban climate governance, which highlights the role that local governments play in proposing strategies to deal with climate change, to present and discuss data related to: 1)…
To co-produce or not to co-produce
Mainstreaming climate adaptation in the megacity of São Paulo, Brazil
City governments worldwide are increasingly introducing adaptation actions and climate responses in their policies and agendas, but the speed and success of these initiatives vary widely. Understanding these interventions, barriers and opportunities for urban adaptation remains a challenge for scholars and policy-makers. In this paper, we assess climate adaptation policy in the megacity of São Paulo, Brazil, paying special attention to missed opp…
The co-production of science and policy in integrated climate assessments
Creating usable science: Opportunities and constraints for climate knowledge use and their implications for science policy
Re-conceptualizing the Anthropocene: A call for collaboration
Since it was first proposed in 2000, the concept of the Anthropocene has evolved in breadth and diversely. The concept encapsulates the new and unprecedented planetary-scale changes resulting from societal transformations and has brought to the fore the social drivers of global change. The concept has revealed tensions between generalized interpretations of humanity's contribution to global change, and interpretations that are historically, polit…
Unpacking governance: Building adaptive capacity to climate change of river basins in Brazil
Down to Earth: Contextualizing the Anthropocene
The ‘Anthropocene’ is now being used as a conceptual frame by different communities and in a variety of contexts to understand the evolving human–environment relationship. However, as we argue in this paper, the notion of an Anthropos, or ‘humanity’, as global, unified ‘geological force’ threatens to mask the diversity and differences in the actual conditions and impacts of humankind, and does not do justice to the diversity of local and regional…
Differentiating capacities as a means to sustainable climate change adaptation
Adaptation and the state: Latin America and the challenge of capacity-building under globalization
Linking development to climate adaptation: Leveraging generic and specific capacities to reduce vulnerability to drought in NE Brazil
To respond to climate impact, poor agricultural households in less developed regions rely on different types of assets that define their overall adaptive capacity (AC). However not all assets build capacity equally. In this study we argue that building AC requires a combination of interventions that address not only climate-related risks (specific capacity) but also the structural deficits (e.g., lack of income, education, health, political power…
Co-producing science for sustainability: Can funding change knowledge use
There is widespread belief that meaningful interaction between scientists and practitioners, or co-production, increases use of scientific knowledge about sustainability and environmental change. Although funders are increasingly encouraging co-production, there have been few empirical studies assessing the outcomes of these efforts in shaping knowledge use. In this study, we systematically analyze research project reports (n = 120) and interview…
To co-produce or not to co-produce
Can Water Reform Survive Politics? Institutional Change and River Basin Management in Ceará, Northeast Brazil
Actionable knowledge and the art of engagement
The politics of pollution control in Brazil: State actors and social movements cleaning up Cubatão
What influences climate information use in water management? The role of boundary organizations and governance regimes in Brazil and the U.S
Risk? Crisis? Emergency? Implications of the new climate emergency framing for governance and policy
The term “climate emergency” represents a new phase in climate change framing that many hope will invigorate more climate action. Yet there has been relatively little discussion of how the new emergency framing might shape broader governance and policy. In this advanced review, we critically review and synthesize existing literature on crisis and emergency to inform our understanding of how this new shift might affect governance and policy. Speci…
Increasing information usability for climate adaptation: The role of knowledge networks and communities of practice
Institutions and change: The challenge of building adaptive capacity in Latin America
A tale of two policies: The politics of climate forecasting and drought relief in Ceará, Brazil
A less disastrous disaster: Managing response to climate-driven hazards in the Cayman Islands and NE Brazil
Who are boundary spanners and how can we support them in making knowledge more actionable in sustainability fields
Inclusão, deliberação e controle: Três dimensões dedemocracia nos comitês e consórcios de bacias hidrográficas no Brasil
Este trabalho avalia o efeito democratizante da governança participativa na gestão das águas, a partir de uma pesquisa junto a 626 membros de 14 comitês e 4 consórcios de bacias hidrográficas. A noção de democracia é examinada segundo três noções: a) as arenas participativas devem promover a inclusão e combater a dominação das elites; b) a participação deve promover um processo dinâmico capaz de modificar a compreensão dos participantes; e c) as …
Developing Adaptation and Adapting Development
"Climate change is upon us. The fourth assessment report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change clearly describes the evidence of a changing climate (IPCC 2007a,b). Although scientists disagree about the extent to which these changes will happen, they do agree that there have been and will be changes in average climatic conditions, there will be changes in the frequency and intensity of weather hazards, already variable climates will be…
Network Location and Policy‐Oriented Behavior: An Analysis of Two‐Mode Networks of Coauthored Documents Concerning Climate Change in the Great Lakes Region
This study explores how a scientist's location in science‐based policy networks can affect her policy‐oriented behaviors. In particular, we hypothesize that those scientists who fill structural holes in their networks will be more likely than others to engage in policy‐oriented behaviors. The network data are defined by scientists' coauthorship on policy documents regarding climate change in the Great Lakes. We employ a two‐mode network analysis …
Household Livelihood Differentiation and Vulnerability to Climate Hazards in Rural China
Climate projections and their impact on policy and practice
This article examines the relationship between projections of climate change and the responses to those projections. First, it discusses uncertainty and its role in shaping not only the production of climate projections but also the use of these projections by decision makers. We find that uncertainty critically affects the way climate projections move from useful to usable, where usefulness is defined by scientists' perception of users' needs, a…
The politics of pollution control in Brazil: State actors and social movements cleaning up Cubatão
Public participation in the Becc: Lessons from the Acuaférico Project, Nogales, Sonora
This paper examines the Acuaférico Project that was proposed by the city of Nogales, in the state of Sonora, Mexico, to upgrade and improve the city's potable water supply system. Because the cities of Nogales, Arizona, and Nogales, Sonora (known as Ambos Nogales) share the same water resources, the Acuaférico Project has transboundary implications. In 1996, Nogales, Sonora, submitted the Acuaférico Project proposal to the Border Environment Coop…
A tale of two policies: The politics of climate forecasting and drought relief in Ceará, Brazil
Looking for Sustainability: Environmental Coalitions across the State-Society Divide
This paper compares environmental policymaking in two Brazilian cities, Rio de Janeiro and Cubatão. It examines the formation of state-society synergistic interactions in the public policymaking process and their effect on long term sustainability of social mobilization. It concludes that whereas social capital can be constructed in the context of policymaking, it is critically dependent on a concerted effort from both state and society actors to…
Can Water Reform Survive Politics? Institutional Change and River Basin Management in Ceará, Northeast Brazil
Adaptation and the state: Latin America and the challenge of capacity-building under globalization
The co-production of science and policy in integrated climate assessments
Environmental Governance
This chapter reviews the literature relevant to environmental governance in four domains of scholarship: globalization, decentralization, market and individual incentives-based governance, and cross-scale governance. It argues that in view of the complexity and multiscalar character of many of the most pressing environmental problems, conventional debates focused on pure modes of governance–where state or market actors play the leading role–fall …
Developing Adaptation and Adapting Development
"Climate change is upon us. The fourth assessment report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change clearly describes the evidence of a changing climate (IPCC 2007a,b). Although scientists disagree about the extent to which these changes will happen, they do agree that there have been and will be changes in average climatic conditions, there will be changes in the frequency and intensity of weather hazards, already variable climates will be…
A less disastrous disaster: Managing response to climate-driven hazards in the Cayman Islands and NE Brazil
Managing Waters of the Paraíba do Sul River Basin, Brazil: A Case Study in Institutional Change and Social Learning
Kumler, L. M., and M. C. Lemos. 2008. Managing waters of the Paraíba do Sul river basin, Brazil: a case study in institutional change and social learning. Ecology and Society 13(2): 22. https://doi.org/10.5751/ES-02597-130222
Unpacking governance: Building adaptive capacity to climate change of river basins in Brazil
Institutions and change: The challenge of building adaptive capacity in Latin America
Creating Less Disastrous Disasters
Inclusão, deliberação e controle: Três dimensões dedemocracia nos comitês e consórcios de bacias hidrográficas no Brasil
Este trabalho avalia o efeito democratizante da governança participativa na gestão das águas, a partir de uma pesquisa junto a 626 membros de 14 comitês e 4 consórcios de bacias hidrográficas. A noção de democracia é examinada segundo três noções: a) as arenas participativas devem promover a inclusão e combater a dominação das elites; b) a participação deve promover um processo dinâmico capaz de modificar a compreensão dos participantes; e c) as …
Climate projections and their impact on policy and practice
This article examines the relationship between projections of climate change and the responses to those projections. First, it discusses uncertainty and its role in shaping not only the production of climate projections but also the use of these projections by decision makers. We find that uncertainty critically affects the way climate projections move from useful to usable, where usefulness is defined by scientists' perception of users' needs, a…
Creating usable science: Opportunities and constraints for climate knowledge use and their implications for science policy
Integrated and Adaptive Management of Water Resources: Tensions, Legacies, and the Next Best Thing
Engle, N. L., O. R. Johns, M. Lemos, and D. R. Nelson. 2011. Integrated and adaptive management of water resources: tensions, legacies, and the next best thing. Ecology and Society 16(1): 19. https://doi.org/10.5751/ES-03934-160119
How does Diversity Matter? The Case of Brazilian River Basin Councils
Diversity as a concept has often been perceived as a positive system attribute to pursue and protect. However, in some social settings, the way different kinds of diversity shape outcomes can vary significantly. Diversity of ideas and individuals sometimes can lead to disagreement and conflict, which in turn can lead to both positive and negative outcomes. In this study, we examine identity diversity, i.e., age, income, education, worldviews, etc…
Climate Change: New Dimensions in Disaster Risk, Exposure, Vulnerability, and Resilience
Disaster signifies extreme impacts suffered when hazardous physical events interact with vulnerable social conditions to severely alter the normal functioning of a community or a society (high confidence). Social vulnerability and exposure are key determinants of disaster risk and help explain why non-extreme physical events and chronic hazards can also lead to extreme impacts and disasters, while some extreme events do not. Extreme impacts on hu…
What influences climate information use in water management? The role of boundary organizations and governance regimes in Brazil and the U.S
Cool heads for a hot world – Social sciences under a changing sky
Network Location and Policy‐Oriented Behavior: An Analysis of Two‐Mode Networks of Coauthored Documents Concerning Climate Change in the Great Lakes Region
This study explores how a scientist's location in science‐based policy networks can affect her policy‐oriented behaviors. In particular, we hypothesize that those scientists who fill structural holes in their networks will be more likely than others to engage in policy‐oriented behaviors. The network data are defined by scientists' coauthorship on policy documents regarding climate change in the Great Lakes. We employ a two‐mode network analysis …
Agricultural Advisors: A Receptive Audience for Weather and Climate Information
As the climate in the midwestern United States becomes increasingly variable because of global climate change, it is critical to provide tools to the agricultural community to ensure adaptability and profitability of agricultural cropping systems. When used by farmers and their advisors, agricultural decision support tools can reduce uncertainty and risks in the planning, operation, and management decisions of the farm enterprise. Agricultural ad…
Actionable Knowledge for Environmental Decision Making: Broadening the Usability of Climate Science
Despite the rapid evolution and growing complexity in models of science-society interaction, the rate and breadth of use of scientific knowledge in environmental decision making, especially related to climate variability and change, remain below expectations. This suggests a persistent gap between production and use that, to date, efforts to rethink and restructure science production have not been able to surmount. We review different models of s…
Political science (40 works) · Geography (36 works) · Business (33 works) · Computer Science (30 works) · Environmental resource management (29 works) · Climate change (28 works) · Ecology (28 works) · Economics (28 works) · Sustainability and Climate Change Governance (21 works) · Environmental planning (20 works)