Abstract
This study analyses the environmental, socio-economic and
institutional factors that influence community-based adaptation strategies in 16
municipalities in the rural Andes of Colombia. The study focuses specifically on
the factors that influence whether communities decide to take measures to manage
their water and micro-watersheds in response to water scarcity caused by climate
variability and land-use changes. The research uses quantitative and qualitative
methods incorporating data from surveys to 104 water user associations,
precipitation and land-use data, municipal socio-economic information, and semistructured interviews with key informants. The results reveal 1) the links between
environmental change and the type of adaptation that communities implement,
and 2) how, in face of water scarcity changes, external funding facilitates
adaptation. The findings of this study contributes to the common-pool resource
and adaptation literatures by highlighting the important role that external actors
may have in shaping collective action to adapt to environmental change.