摘要：In recent years, the prospects of severe climatechange have increasingly focused attention on thelong-term sustainability of current practices ofresource management, which no longer appearrobust to uncertainty from extreme weather eventsor trends. Increased awareness of uncertainties andthe complexity of the systems to be managedhighlight the need for some profound changes inresource management (Gleick 2000, Pahl-Wostl2007). Uncertainties and complexity have alwayscharacterized water management. Water managementtraditionally emphasizes the reduction ofuncertainties, often by designing systems that canbe predicted and controlled. This has resulted in astrong emphasis on technical solutions to rathernarrowly defined problems. However, human–technology–environment systems are more appropriatelydescribed as complex adaptive systems whereunpredictable co-evolution makes uncertaintyirreducible. Managing under inevitable uncertaintyrequires improved learning and adaptation, inaddition to control. The goal of management shouldbe to increase the adaptive capacity to learn fromand better cope with uncertain developments, ratherthan to try to find optimum solutions. Water-management science must confront the mainbarriers to learning and adaptation: path dependenceemerging from sunk costs in prior paradigms,infrastructure, and existing practices. Developingnew paradigms and practices has gained increasingimportance with the attempt to implementintegrated management approaches
关键词：adaptive management; climate change; interdisciplinary research; social learning; water;resources
